Wolf Lake: The Virtual Second Season
by Sapphira2
Summary: Sequel to the "Conclusion to the Wolf Lake Series: Virtual Season One Continuation"... "Can't Have Just One" Part Three of Three is finally up! Please Review!
1. Disclaimer, Author's Note, and Interview

"Wolf Lake: The Virtual Second Season" 

Written by Sapphira,

And based on the cancelled CBS/UPN TV series, Wolf Lake

**Sequel to "The Virtual First Season Continuation"**

**~*~**

**Disclaimer: **Don't own any of it… not the characters (unless they are my original creations) the music, or the original TV series in any form… I am making no profit off of this, or ANY of my other fanfics… I'm writing it purely for my own enjoyment, and hopefully for the enjoyment of some of the fellow fans.

**~*~**

**Author's Note – **Okay, people... don't get too excited. I won't be posting the first part of the premiere of the second virtual season for another couple of days… This is just an author's note and specs entry (as well as a couple of treats related to the VS2 and VS3 towards the end that you should definitely check out!)… 

Okay then, where to begin? Why is my second virtual season premiering here first, rather than at PVT, like I informed all of you back at the ending of my first season it would? Well, I've had a little bit of a difficult time with PVT of late, and even though I'm still affiliated with them, and will continue to hopefully post my series there, I'm going to be using ff.net as my primary release place, just like I did with the first season…

Speaking of PVT, remember the awards that I had mentioned a long time back? Well, my series was nominated for I think 14, but only won two…best new series, and best love story (Luke and Sophia)… and although I'm thrilled that they at least won those two, the authenticity and fairness of the judges was apparently called into question, as some people were concerned that the judges gave the majority of the awards to those who they were friends with, rather than give them to whose work was the best…  Fortunately in some ways, I only have one possible entry for this year's award ceremony (if they even have one this year) and that is my finale for the first season… and if that doesn't get an award after being nearly 28,000 words in length… (growl) 

But I'd still like to thank all of you who nominated me for those awards to begin with. Your support was amazing and very touching.

Expect things to be a little different than they were in the first virtual season… Instead of posting an ENTIRE virtual episode in one entry, I'm going to be breaking up all of the episodes into two, but more often three parts. That way, I'll be able to post more frequently, and it'll also provide me with more time between episodes to relax, and work on other projects.

Now then, before going any further, there's something else I want to address…

Although there has been a tremendous outpouring of support from the fans over the months of this series' hiatus, and the mass majority of all of you have been incredibly understanding, there is a very small minority (about four or five) that have been a little too pushy in regards to when I would begin the virtual second season. And a couple have severely crossed the line. They flooded my e-mails with repetitions of the same messages over and over again, they get pissed off when I refuse to answer them, and then they act as if they have the right to treat me like dirt, simply because I'm not writing what they want to hear. I have had to remove countless frustrated reviews on my OTHER projects, simply because their authors were unhappy that I was writing for other genres that were not WL, and I'm getting sick of feeling guilty every time I want to write something that isn't WL… 

When I posted the last author's note for the Virtual Continuation of the First Season, I stated quite clearly that although I was hoping to begin the second season in late fall or early winter, I reserved the right for it to be as late as the beginning of 2004, which has only now rolled around… 

I love writing. Writing fanfic has not only strengthened my writing ability in general, but it has provided me a much needed outlet when it comes to my life, and without it these last couple of years, well… I just don't know what state I would be in at the moment. I've developed incredible friendships, and I have literally received messages from people around the globe that have enjoyed not only this series, but my other ones as well. There is no greater honor than that.

But I have to tell you… Coming back to the WL genre has not been easy. It's been a chore. That's part of why it has taken so long to get this premiere out. The passion that I felt so strongly during the first season that had me churning out almost 200,000 words in only six months is currently not so strong.

Writing this premiere was probably the hardest thing I've had to do in a long time… and I want it to be understood that I've only done it for two reasons… A) for all those same fans that have supported me in the RIGHT way throughout this last year from all around the globe, and B) because I'm still hopeful that that same passion will come back to me, and that it wasn't just a fluke.

The majority of my series is planned out. I know what's gonna be happening, and I know pretty much how it is all going to end, unlike in the first season. But to get it to that conclusion, I can't be feeling like it's a chore. That is not what writing is. It is a love, a passion, and a product of your very soul. That is the way I feel about the first season I've already created… and it is what I'm still hoping to feel for this one… just understand that I'm not feeling that just of yet.

In a way, I think the reason why I feel so disconnected from my WL writings at this moment, is because I feel a sort of resentment towards it. Like I've already said, I've had those that have harassed me because I was writing for another series, like Tarzan… but you have to realize something… the life of this virtual second season is owed in its entirety to the "Reflections" series that I created for that other genre… That series helped me remember what it was like to really have your heart wrapped up in a storyline.

Which only made it harder to come back to WL when those who weren't pleased with where my writing was being directed, started pushing me even harder about the virtual series.

I am NOT going to put up any longer with feeling guilty for writing a story that I love, I don't care what it is, or what genre it is for… If I have to put one thing on hold for a little while to work on something else, then you'll all just have to deal with it. In the end, it'll all work out better, because it will help keep the series from becoming stale or noticeably forced, and it'll keep me happy.

I am still planning with all of my heart completing my series in its entirety. I am not the kind of person that could live with myself if I gave up on a story. That's not who I am. Not only is there going to be a second season, but there will be a third as well, with the possibilities of future sequels. I have to prove to myself that I can do this, before trying to publish on the mainstream market… and working in fanfiction has helped me cultivate my writing abilities in ways that I had never expected. I truly think, looking back on just the first few episodes in the Virtual Season One Continuation, that my talents have really grown a lot over the span of almost two years… and I think some of you will be able to see that difference in the VS2… 

To be perfectly clear, **_I am in no shape or form giving up on this series._** But if it takes me longer than just a couple of weeks to post a new episode, or I post another project instead, then that is the way its going to be, and all of you will just have to deal with it. It's either that or I shelve the project all together.

Okay, now that that has been said, keep your eyes peeled. The premiere has already been created in entirety, I'm just putting those final touches on it. The first part will be posted sometime in the next few days, so keep checking back…

Anyway, as a thank you for putting up with my ramblings, read on for a sneak preview of the premiere, as well as a revealing interview compiled by one of my closest friends and a big fan as well…

Here's to another season!

Yours faithfully,

Sapphira

P.S. If you would like to keep track of what is going on in the creation of this series, as well as my other projects and life in general, then check out my new online journal. There will be a lot of stuff released there that I won't even necessarily be releasing at my message board, as I try to keep my announcements there official and professional.

The journal however, will address all different aspects of VS2 and VS3, including almost daily blow by blows of each episode's progress towards getting released… 

It'll basically just be a helpful way of keeping everyone informed of what is going on, and whether or not I'm even working on anything at that given time.

So, make sure you take the time to check it out, and book-mark it if you are interested in checking into it on a regular basis. Go to my bio page and scroll down to the end of my bio to reach the link, or type in the (make sure you put the www. In front of it)

~*~ 

((Preview))

The flames of the massive bonfires swept staggeringly high, and the intense flickering glow cast against the expanse of her smooth, pale skin revealed to the night air still carrying a chill from the dying winter months. Beads of moisture slid off of her lithe form in a constant repetition, as she tossed her head back. Flinging the now almost waist-length sodden mass of dark hair away from her face. Using her fingers to help with the process as she slowly began to make her way down the length of the docks. Her soaked black bra and matching underwear still intact and covering their respective areas despite not having been intended for swim wear. 

She made her way up the plank wood steps. Blinking water out of her eyes, and oblivious to the way reflections of the firelight caught in the beads of water still clinging to her skin. Turning them into faint shimmering embers, that echoed in the depths of her dark eyes. A familiar crystal pendant settled on its silver chain against the place over her heart. 

~*~

Many of you have asked me various questions about what I was planning for the Virtual Season, but at that time, I was unable to answer you… however, with the premiere looming, a friend of mine suggested that it would be fun to compile all of the more important and revealing questions into sort of a Q & A… so here goes! (Thanks go to CherryBomb for coming up with this idea, and "giving the interview"… you're the greatest!)

**Q – What are some of the surprises that await us in the Virtual Second Season? What can you share with us without giving too much away?**

A – Well, I think one of the biggest is going to be with Tyler's character. I've heard of some other authors who refer to their characters almost as if they were real, and how they all took on different personalities and attitudes during the writing process… Some were more dominant, others were hard to fit in. Some wanted to cooperate with your initial plans, while others completely took over and wrote their own story.

Well, I can relate to this now, because that is exactly what happened with Tyler… Up until the finale of the first season, I had every intent of killing his character off. He hadn't been what I had considered a major player throughout the VSOC anyways, as he had always been difficult to fit in… but then I got to the part where he was turning Ruby and John over to the Hunters, and his character just exploded to the forefront. Much to my surprise, and I think to the surprise of the fans, I didn't kill him off. But I didn't have much choice in the matter. He took on a life of his own, and apparently would have haunted me for eternity if I had terminated his character… So instead, I inserted a plot twist that even I hadn't been planning on, and he reluctantly became the unlikely hero only to disappear from Wolf Lake after performing his service to the Pack. And even though he isn't going to be coming back to Wolf Lake right away, his story will still be a very critical part in the second virtual season.

He's also not going to know what hit him, as I have many things in store for his character… including not only a new person in his life that is going to turn his entire world as he knows it upside down, but also many temptations from the dark side that he may not be able to refuse a second time. It'll be interesting to see what happens to Wolf Lake's bad boy, as even I'm not too sure at the moment (I mean, he's already completely fooled me once about his intentions)… But he's still going to be a strong driving aspect in the series from here on out. 

I mean, what would Wolf Lake be without the infamous Tyler Creed?

**Q – What about Damien? Will we see him again?**

A – Damien was another character that surprised me in the first season… As he was an original character, I hadn't really anticipated bringing him to forefront the way I did. But then again, when I originally started to create the VSOC, I had no intention of creating a second and third season, and when you're looking at continuing a series for that long, then you need to bring new blood into it, just like they do with an actual TV series… When I first started to write Damien into the series, he immediately developed an attraction for a certain young blonde Skinwalker, whether I liked it or not, and even though developing his character to such a level hadn't been the original intention on my part, I know now that those last few episodes of the VSOC wouldn't have nearly been as good as they were if it hadn't been for him.

So yeah… he'll be a pretty big character in the next two seasons. I think he's going to be one of my favorite characters actually, in the VS2… But he won't be in Wolf Lake, and he has absolutely no intention of ever going back. I really don't know at this time that even if he did, if Presley will be able to forgive him for abandoning her, or if he would even be willing to let down his guard enough for her to do so. You have to remember that their relationship up until his departure from Wolf Lake had been a rather volatile and dangerous one. Damien gave the order for Presley's capture and torture long before he actually found himself in her presence and felt that connection form between the two of them… And you also have to realize that, despite his loyalty to the Skinwalkers, he has been trained all of his life to be a killer. To be unemotional and cold. He still has his demons with him, and he always will. He doesn't believe himself capable of truly being able to safely love someone… or that someone could love him. Not after seeing the full extent of what he was capable of… which again, Presley hasn't.

Some love stories, no matter how incredibly powerful, are just not destined to have the fairy tale endings (like Buffy and Angel for example, to bring up a reference of one of the most powerful love stories to ever happen on the small screen)… But everyone will just have to wait and see which category Damien and Presley's will fall under… Remember, Damien's not a Skinwalker (at least not a full-blooded one) but he's most certainly not human either, which is a concept I don't think Presley (or the fans) have quite grasped onto about him. His nature is such that he could never be mistaken for one over a long period of time. And he's been left with some pretty hefty baggage by his father, whom he killed for those who may not recall that bit from the finale. So be prepared to see a very dangerous, cold, and calculating side of him come out strongly right from the beginning. It was a darkness in him that was only hinted at in the VSOC, that I plan on really delving into this go-round… 

**Q – What about Presley herself? What role will she fulfill in the series to come?**

A – Presley was another surprising character… I know that she was also one of the characters not well liked, and a lot of people didn't want me to keep her around at first, but I actually did see something I liked in this character in the original series, and what I saw was a young woman only doing what was expected of her by skinwalker standards. She wasn't necessarily bad. She was just an alpha bitch (and no, that is not meant in the derogatory sense) trying to maintain her position within the Pack. 

I'm actually very pleased that I set up this whole unrequited love dynamic between her and Damien… it's added an element of that intense relationship angst to the series that I really thought would be needed, what with some of the couples already settling down comfortably with one another… And its something that I know I'm going to enjoy playing around with, even though Presley and Damien are currently on opposite sides of the world.

In the VS2, Presley's destiny will pretty much lie solely in the decisions that Damien will make… You will see her occasionally, but I don't think she'll be a strong character until much later in the series, and that will only be if Damien comes back to Wolf Lake… Until then, I think most of the references you'll see to Presley's character will be in the scenes that Damien has, as he reflects back on her. Even though he has no intention of coming back to her, he's not having as easy a time as he would have preferred forgetting her, either.

**Q – You created some interesting original characters in the VSOC… can you give us any hints of the ones that we will meet in VS2 and VS3?**

A – Not really. Although I can say that there will be a whole heck of a lot more popping up then there was in the first… And more of them will be taking on the kind of strong roles that we saw with Damien, too… Their lives will be entwining rather intimately with the original characters, and I think they will really assist in bringing the entire series to its powerful conclusion over the next two seasons. I will also be bringing a couple of characters only hinted at in the original series to the forefront as well.

**Q – You kind of hinted towards the end of "Never Cry Wolf", that there might be the potential for trouble between Luke and Sophia ahead… are the readers' premonitions about that going to prove to be true, or is it just silly speculation? **

A – (grin) No, it's not just them. Although I am a strong romantic at heart (especially for these two) I believe that any connection with such extensive value like theirs, is never as simple as some of the fairy tales make it out to be. I believe that your true soul mate is worth fighting for, or else how do you know that that bond is worth anything? Luke and Sophia came together very fast in the VSOC, primarily because of everything that was happening around them. They came together on a very instinctive, primal standing, because that was the only option open to them at that time. Well, let's face the facts here… they still carry within themselves that human mentality to screw things up, and they are also still very young. They need time to mature, and make mistakes, and struggle with each other, so they can also grow into their relationship, and have that relationship become stronger for it… So yeah, I'm gonna be throwing a monkey wrench into the mixture, and there is definitely going to be some conflict between them noticeable almost right off the bat. Sophia has accepted her destiny and her abilities, but she still isn't quite as ready as she thought for some of what that entails, so Luke is going to be offering her an ultimatum that is definitely gonna raise the sexual tension between them through the roof, and provide a very spicy – and frustrating – read as things progress.

**Q – Will we see the birth of John and Ruby's twins in the second season?**

A – Maybe… maybe not… You'll just have to wait and find out… Ruby is going to have her hands full with the fulfilling of her side of the prophecy, and John is going to have his hands full with his pregnant wife... (wink)

**Q – What about Matt and Vivian? Will they finally be acknowledged as official mates by the rest of the Pack?**

A – You'll just have to wait and see… But I will say that as far as relationships go, theirs will have the easiest go of it in comparison to the rest of the group.

**Q – What about Rianna? Will she return?**

A – Rianna wasn't exactly Rianna… she was just the image that the ancient yet sentient powers of the white wolf used in order to converse with Sophia… that power is sort of like a collective consciousness of all the white females that have gone before. And to be honest, I really don't think "she'll" be back at all until the finale of the third season… But you never know… something could change.

**Q – What are some of the major over-all plot lines that you will be focusing on in the second season?**

A – The two primary ones are going to be the threat of the radical human society trying to pick up where the now extinct (except for Damien) Hunters left off, and also the knowledge of the second pack's existence, and the impending confrontation between the two Clans, that many fear (with good reason) will turn into an all-out war for dominance and supremacy… I will also be getting into the more political and personal anarchy within the Wolf Lake Clan, that was the driving force of the original series. I will be drawing upon a lot of the different hints that were dropped in those nine episodes about the different factions on opposite sides with one another, as well as their leaders and their heirs… And I will confront the issue of the 'agenda' within the Pack as well, that was the point of one of the conversations between Luke and Tyler and a driving point throughout all nine episodes in the original series as well…

**Q – About how many episodes are we going to be looking at for each season?**

I'm going to be enforcing a much stricter control over the amount of my writing and the length of the 'episodes' than I did with the first season. There will be thirteen episodes per season, so you have a total of twenty-six overall… But it may become necessary to extend that out at the end of the third season, into like a three part finale… but each episode up until then will be averaging roughly between 10,000 and 13,000 words in length. I have taken liberties with the premiere however, as it is the foundation of which the entire VS2 will be placed upon. It ranks close to 19,000.

I will also be breaking up the episodes into two or three parts, to provide not only more frequent updates, but to also allow me to have a break in-between episodes to work on other projects while at the same time keep the fans happy with regular posting.

**Q – Your unofficial soundtrack for your first virtual season continuation seemed to go over well… can you tell us what kind of music we can be looking forward to in the second and third virtual seasons? **

A – That is a very difficult question to answer, because I really don't know till I write a particular scene or episode, what song I'll put with it… Plus I like to keep my choices (if I have any) a secret till then anyways. But I will say that I'm drawing a lot of just my basic inspiration for the series from the more dark, edgy tracks that also seemed to influence the original series. My primary addiction at this time is the soundtrack to "Queen of the Damned"… I think that is probably the most awesome soundtrack I've heard in a long time, and every song on it would fit WL to a T… For those of you that loved the song Change (in the house of flies) by Deftones that played in the original series pilot, when Sophia was in the back seat of Luke's car, and Luke was watching her in the rear-view mirror with glowing eyes, then you will love this soundtrack, because that is the kind of music it is. Change is even on the album, as well as KidneyThieves, who had another one of their songs on the original series as well. Rather ironic, actually… I don't know if I'll actually use any of the music in the VS2 or VS3 soundtrack, but it is possible that one or two of them will pop up. Right now though, it's just providing my muse with the fuel it needs to write this season…

**Q – What about Sherman? What surprises can we expect from him?**

A – lol! Sherman is Sherman. Even I don't dare try to assume what that crazy Keeper is going to do, especially on my time. I'm a little worried that he's going to be a difficult character this season. He's really being very secretive at the moment, and is refusing to give me any hints about what he might be thinking. He may not be quite as prominent in the series right off the bat… he's probably too busy chasing some skirt around town. ;)

**Q – Will you finally confront the issue of Willard Cate's murder?**

A – Yep, I will… but it may not be in the second season… and it **_definitely_** won't be quite what you think!

**Q – What new relationships will be occurring in the VS2 and VS3?**

A – I'm not going to answer that… if you want to know, you'll just have to read and find out with everybody else…

**Q – Looking back on the finished product, if you could, is there anything that you would have changed about the First Season Continuation?**

A – I've wondered that myself… And I think my immediate answer would be yes… there are a couple of things that I think I could have done a little differently… but to be thoroughly honest, I'm actually quite pleased with it overall. I think it is written in the way it was meant to be written, and the way it was meant to be written, was for it to be the foundation of an even bigger story yet to come. 

I mean, yeah, the earlier chapters are noticeably not as well written as the ones that came later – or in comparison to my newest works – but that is just an example of my writing talents being cultivated and polished over the shifting of the months. This change was particularly noticeable to me, in the 10th virtual episode. Up until then it had been a very slow progress, and then all of a sudden it all clicked into place, and really started to flow smoothly. That probably had something to do with finally getting my own PRIVATE computer set up. (grin) And then there are those last three episodes, which I think took my writing to a completely new level.

I do think that the chance is very good though, that I'll eventually go back and do some work on those first nine virtual episodes of mine to polish them up a bit… make things a little less choppy. That is something that I've already done with most of my other early on works.

 This series has been worth it, just for the experience it has provided for me in just the writing aspect. Not to mention in the confidence arena. Especially considering how I used to think I couldn't write worth a flip. (no pun intended… well, maybe a little pun intended. *wink*)

**Q – What about Embrace of the Wolven? What is your plans for that series?**

A – To be honest, I think I should have held off on posting EOTW to begin with… I think I got in just a little too much of a hurry with that series, and was too excited to think things through rationally. I hate the idea of abandoning a story for months on end, but with everything else that has been going on, that is exactly what I've found myself doing. 

Trying to work on two WL projects at the same time is going to be extremely difficult, and I think that EOTW is going to find itself on quite a few long dry spells for a while… but I am still going to try my best to update it now and then with new chapters, even though it really was a series that I should have held off on starting for another half year or so. It's really difficult to have two very different relationships happening to the same couple, being written at the same time… It's something that may take me awhile to learn how to juggle. 

**Q – After it is all said and done, and VS2 and VS3 have been completed, and EOTW had reached its conclusion, will you do anything else for WL?**

A – I really don't know how to answer that at this time… by then I think I'll be wanting to wrap up ALL of my fanfic projects, and begin working on my original series, which isn't going to leave much room for anything else. I think by then I will have told my WL stories to the fullest extent possible, and will probably just bow out gracefully from the genre. You can only take a story so far, and this one is going far and beyond anything else I've ever done, or even seen. I don't think I've read another fanfic series that already has the word count that this one does, and it's not even halfway completed. 

But that is a question you really should just ask me again when the day arrives in which I upload that final chapter to my WL epic, and then I should be able to answer it more decisively.

**Q – What about some of your other fanfic projects? What else do you have in mind to create?**

A – Go to my bio page… you'll be able to read all about the stories that I have rolling around predominately in my mind at this moment… But definitely nothing ever again as extensive as this series has become. (grin) I'll be saving that energy for my original series…

**Q – Why did you start the Virtual Seasons?**

A – Well, when I first began to scribble "Wolven Behavior" down in my notebook, I never had the faintest idea that the first virtual season continuation would become as big as it did. I wasn't even planning on doing more than eight or nine episodes, which is probably a good thing. If I had known just what it would grow into, I probably never would have even bothered to pick up my pencil! 

But I am glad that I did… I mean, how can you possibly know what you can do, until you bother to do it? I had never considered myself much of a writer before I began this series… and now I'm laying the ground works for something all my own that you will hopefully see on the main-stream market in a few years. As of a few years ago, that wasn't a realistic dream of mine, but now it is. My writing fanfic was what had a hand in that change.

For that alone, I owe this series and the people who have supported it everything… And it is an experience I know I'll always carry with me, and an accomplishment that I know I'll never forget.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 


	2. Where The Wild Things Play, Part One of ...

Virtual Season Two – Episode #25

"Where The Wild Things Play" 

Part One of Three

Based on the cancelled TV series, Wolf Lake,

written by Sapphira

Sequel to "The Virtual First Season Continuation"

**Disclaimer: **Don't own any of it… not the characters (unless they are my original creations) the music, or the original TV series in any form… I am making no profit off of this, or ANY of my other fanfics… I'm writing it purely for my own enjoyment, and hopefully for the enjoyment of some of the fellow fans.

* * *

  


Summary – The next chapter in the lives of those connected to Wolf Lake has been opened, and its pages will prove that the story you thought you knew, is only just beginning as the secrets still hidden unknowingly within the fold of the Clan will start to threaten to rip it apart at its very seams…

* * *

  


Timeline – Three months after the events of the finale of the First Season Continuation 

* * *

  


_Moscow__, Russia__ 2:14 am_

The night had reached its darkest peak, and there was a chill to the land that only those in residence of this country could comprehend.  One didn't truly know what coldness was unless they came here. Especially during the harsh winter months.

A young man hidden in the shadows of an alleyway, buried in the heart of an abandoned section of one of the darkest corners of a frozen city, stood there rubbing his palms together reflexively and looking around nervously. 

Even those who finally did come to this land still were faced with the difficulty of the climate. And many were only more than happy to leave this land behind as fast as they could. Unable to accept the possibility of existing in it much longer than absolutely necessary.

But then there were always the very few that actually found a home here. A very select few that actually found themselves welcoming the frigid temperatures, even though this was not the land of their birth…

Maybe it was because they needed a home that was as cold as they were.

Looking down at his watch for the countless time, he suppressed the shivers trying to race up the length of his body despite the thick clothes and the heavy coat wrapped about his frame. The wind was picking up again, and not even the warmest clothes in his possession could ever be enough to keep those frigid fingers from penetrating those barriers to freeze against his skin.

Looking around himself again, he acknowledged that the only reason why this alleyway was barren of any other life was because even the criminals of Moscow's underworld weren't foolish enough to conduct even the foulest of their businesses in its streets at this hour. Where no other hindrance of man could ever hope to keep them from their corrupted lifestyles, the most basic nature of the land surrounding them did.

This was the only time where such areas became as neutral a location as a church or playground… and it was only because it was a time that hardly anyone could expect to survive out in it for very long.

He left out a frustrated breath and watched as it frosted in the night air as soon as it left his mouth. He pulled closer into the minimal shelter provided by one of the ancient buildings flanking him, and leaned his back against it. Hunching into himself in an attempt to block the worst of the wind that had now stirred up into a frenzy, and feeling the faint stirrings of anger for having been kept waiting as long as he had. 

He didn't know how long he remained in that position, but when he felt a much larger portion of his body start to go numb, he decided he had had enough. 

Preparing to leave, he pushed himself away from the wall, and crossed over into the center of the alleyway in preparation to leave, when he sensed more than saw sudden movement slinking towards him. A shadow swathed against the darkness of the night that only relief was in the pale carpeting of snow and ice that crunched beneath the figure's feet as he moved closer. Revealing the line of his form being that of a man's. 

Speaking unthinkingly, the young, nearly frozen man foolishly said the first thing that came to his lips.

"You're late."

He heard a short sound that should have been interpreted as laughter, but it wasn't humor ringing in that voice that made the young man regret having spoken that accusation. He watched warily as more and more of the figure slipped away from the shadows into the faint circle of muted light cast by a dull overhead bulb. His open black leather trench coat swirling about his feet in the wind. 

"And what makes you think that?"

The young man nearly flinched at the sound of that voice. "Y-you were supposed to meet me here at 2:00am."

"No, I wasn't. I told **_you_** to be here at 2:00am… There is a difference."

The figure came to a stop just a few feet away, and the young man was once again reminded of what kind of being he was dealing with, by what his wardrobe consisted of. 

Despite the sub-zero temperatures, he only wore a dark sweater and leather pants tucked into boots. His hands and throat were bare, and his skin was almost the same shade as the snow under their feet. The only article of clothing that could be considered protective was the black leather trench coat, but it was wide open, and it wasn't hard to assume that even that was only there just for appearances.  

Seeing this man – if he could indeed be called that – in person made it very easy for the younger man to believe that any semblance of humanity or civilized behavior that he may witness here tonight was nothing more than a façade. 

Standing this close to someone who was now the sole embodiment of a thousand years of the darkest of the dark legends and myths, he could almost see the countless generations of bloodshed and death in those soulless eyes.

The man in front of him tilted his head to the side, and one dark brow rose slightly.

"Is there something wrong?" the question should have sounded like one of concern, and on any other's lips it would have been. But on his… 

He knew exactly what kind of fear he was inspiring, and the younger man knew then that if this inhuman being was capable of such an emotion as humor, then he was feeling it right now… at the younger man's expense.

He shook his head, and would have voiced a denial, but the dark one stopped him in mid-breath with another question.

"Did you bring it?"

He nodded. Fingers fumbling in his front pocket as he fished out a small flat object. His eyes never leaving the dangerous figure in front of him.

He didn't seem the least bit concerned about the younger man reaching into his pocket. He didn't seem the least bit concerned that the younger man might have had a weapon. He wasn't even armed himself. At least not with any weapon that could be seen.

But the younger man knew better than most that one of things that made this man so dangerous was that he didn't need a weapon. He was the weapon. And he could move with the speed and accuracy and strength that no mere human could ever hope to match. Even an armed one.

Finally withdrawing his hand, he held out the disk, and waited for the other man to take it.

"I'm assuming that everything we discussed is on here?"

He nodded quickly. Anxiety apparent in his skittish gaze. "The locations of Vega Controls and the weapons and biological laboratories are, as well as info on all personal members and bases located in Russia."

He watched as the dark one took the disk from his nerveless fingers and slid it into his front pants pocket. The supple leather hiding it from view seamlessly. "Your… assistance in this matter is appreciated. I'm trusting that you are already pleased with the amount forwarded over to your private account?"

"It is a very generous amount."

"Good. The rest of your fee will be transferred upon confirmation that the information on this disk is accurate."

The younger man bristled slightly. "I assure you it is."

The other man smiled. If a faint twisting to his lips set in a face that still bore absolutely no emotion could be called a smile. "I am not suggesting that you have swindled me. I doubt that even the lowest members of your group would ever be that foolish to try and deceive one of my kind."

The younger man wasn't exactly sure how to respond to that, so he wisely said nothing in response. 

"I am also… assuming that you shall be leaving Moscow tonight?"

"Y-yes. I have to be long gone, in case the people I work for find out about what I've done. They don't take betrayal very well." He frowned slightly then. "I have wondered, however, why it is that you need this information. The Society leaders would love nothing more than to take you on as one of our leaders. Why not join them?"

The dark one cocked his head to the side. His midnight dark hair tumbling about his shoulders loosely. His eyes glittering strangely, as the shadows of the alleyway played upon the carved and cold perfection of a face that looked as if it had never even seen daylight.

"I am follower to no man. And my reasons for requiring this information are just that. Mine. It is no longer your concern."

The younger man nodded quickly. "Of course, Mr. Van Halen. It makes no difference to me anyhow."

He hadn't even gotten those words out in their entirety before the dark one had already turned around, and was beginning to disappear back into the frigid shadows surrounding them once more.

He knew that he should take his abrupt dismissal gracefully, and just leave. Leave now. He knew he should forget about asking any more questions or having any more contact with this strange person. But even though he was no longer willing to work with the Society, the curiosity was still there. And only the leaders of the Society had ever met with one of his kind face to face.

He simply couldn't let the chance slip past. No matter how foolish it might be to try and continue to talk to this… man as if he was just another simple human being.

But yet having still come to that conclusion, he had a hard time forcing the words out while remembering the hint of the dormant power behind those black eyes. 

But force them out he did, because he had to understand how such a dark, powerful, and bloodthirsty army could be reduced to just this one last survivor. A survivor that he hadn't even really believed until this very moment was still alive.

"Why did your brethren willingly carry with them the very objects that could destroy them?" he called out to that retreating back quickly before he could change his mind. "Why did they keep with them the one weakness that could be exploited and used against them?"

The dark one turned back. Face pale against the spill of the backdrop of the night, as his coat flared out slightly in resistance of the wind as he moved.

He was silent for a while. So silent, that the younger man feared he would only have to blink and he would be gone as if he had never even existed. As if he had only been a figment of his imagination. A dream brought on by the potential possibility of mild hypothermia.

But he didn't disappear. He stood right there, staring back into his face, and the younger man didn't have to imagine the deaths of a thousand years reflected there… he could literally see their presence burning there in that unblinking gaze.

When he finally did begin to speak, it was all the younger man could do to keep from jumping out his skin by the sudden change in the heavy silence that had fallen.

"If your only chance to fulfill your ordained destiny to destroy your sworn enemy lay in the possibility of dying at the very force that would make it possible for you to triumph, then what would you imagine **_you _**would be willing to risk in order to finally win?" A slight shifting of his shoulders marked what could be considered a shrug. "For my brethren it was... everything."

"But you survived. You didn't die with the rest of them."

Those black eyes flickered slightly with what could only be called emotion, but it was so quick that the younger man couldn't hope to interpret which one it was, and those eyes were once again so frigid that it left him wondering if he had even seen anything to begin with. 

"Apparently I didn't desire it as… ferociously as they did."

Unlike his eyes, his tone was noticeably altered, and the younger man fell silent. Watching as the last of a race almost as old as the Skinwalkers themselves finally turned away and melted back into the night. Stepping into its embrace as if he was made of it.

The wind kicked up another notch, and blew snow over his tracks. Hiding even those from view. He had disappeared as if he had never even been there. As if he had never even existed.

Only the younger man knew the truth… and a big part of that for him was wrapped up in the fact that his front pocket was noticeably lighter…

… and the unsettling notion that he had just stared straight into the abyss and had somehow managed to survive the encounter relatively unscathed, despite how the abyss had stared right back.

* * *

  


A couple of blocks away, a dark shadow shifted and merged into those that cloaked a dark corner as a figure emerged from within them in order to lean his hip against the tall lamp post crowned by a single flickering light that cast a halo in the snow blanketing the cracked pavement and broken rocks beneath it. 

Damien tilted his head back and looked up into the night sky. Studying the various constellations with a mild interest as he acknowledged with almost a sense of faint bemusement how different this very night sky must look on the other side of the world. 

He didn't seem to be aware of the drama beginning to unfold just a few blocks away, as a young man finally emerged warily from a dark alleyway, and made his way hurriedly towards his vehicle parked only about a hundred yards away. Hands tucked deeply into his coat pockets and his chin tucked under as he battled against the invading cold and dreamed of finally making it to his car and the warm security he would find once within it.  

He couldn't have even known the exact moment that the younger man finally did make it to his car, or the way that he slid into the front seat with a sense of relief. Shutting the door firmly behind him to block out the frigid chill of the night wind.

But he still didn't even so much as blink when the sound of an explosion rocked the silence of the night, or how the earth beneath his feet reverberated with the mild shock waves radiating from such a close range. 

He didn't acknowledge the sudden blaze of light that reached towards the heavens, as the explosion reached its peak, or how suddenly the silence of the night became a vacuum as the vicious sound faded away. Bleeding back into the quietness of a night that had just been temporarily violated.

He stood there for a little while longer. Watching as clouds slowly began to roll in, blocking out the sparkling pinpricks of light embedded against the darkest of backdrops. 

It was only when no more of the night sky was visible that he finally dropped his head, and pushed himself away from the pole. Duster swirling about his legs as he moved. 

He moved his way down yet another one of the abandoned pathways, as the sharp sound of sirens in the distance became an interruption to the silence once more and the air surrounding him became permeated with the harsh, acrid scent of smoke...

And the fresh snow above him finally began to fall.

* * *

  


_One month later…_

It was dark under the cold surface of the lake's murky depths, and even with her enhanced vision, Sophia couldn't really see through it. So she didn't try. She just allowed her body to float along, legs and arms slicing through the water languidly. Not particularly caring which direction she was going, as a set destination wasn't what was intended while she remained submerged as long as she was able.

The muted silence that the water provided however, was. It allowed her mind a momentary sense of relief and peace. Almost like a sensory deprivation chamber, with only the sound of her heart beat thumbing rhythmically in her chest echoing in her ears.

But like all good things, it wasn't going to last her very long. 

It basically was just a couple of minutes that allowed her to sort of refuel before facing the masses once more, and being forced to place the whole strong white female image back into place. Just a couple of minutes that she took every single time she had to reluctantly come to one of these, that even those just a few feet away from her would never even know about. Although she often wondered just how many of them did exactly what she was doing now from time to time.

She stayed like that for a little while longer. Trying to ignore the steadily increasing pressure building up in her lungs, as she felt the cold water of the lake move over her body caught within the faint tug of the tides. Rocking her back and forth slowly in its embrace.

But even she knew her limits, and eventually they forced her to start to move upwards.

Tilting her head up, she viewed from below the way the light from the bonfires cast a flickering red and orange glow over the dancing surface of the water, and she slowly moved her hands towards it. Propelling herself to the surface. Her dark curtain of hair fanning out gently over the sides of face, and caressing against the curve of her neck and shoulders.

**(Soundtrack Suggestion – "Truth or Dare" by N.E.R.D. and featuring Kelis & Pusha T, and on the album "In Search Of…" and  "xXx the Soundtrack" ) **

When she broke the surface, she entered a completely different world. One where peaceful or relaxation were two very different cards not a part of this particular game.

No matter how prepared she might have been, it was still always enough to send you into momentary sensory shock. 

First thing that hit you was the bombardment of sight and music echoing through the darkness of night… an overwhelming combination when it was the youth of the Wolf Lake Clan putting it together. It was easy to be taken aback by it at first, as if you should have been prepared for it…

But Raves on the 'Hill' and the young Skinwalkers who threw them didn't care about one's personal comfort level. They just tossed you carelessly into their world whether you liked it or not, and figured you'd survive.

In one smooth, fluid motion from using muscles that no mere human could possess, she thrust her body firmly from the water, and leapt onto the wooden docks just a couple of feet away. Ignoring the various couples that had moved their erotic games from land to the dark surface of the lake, and not particularly caring about the amount of water that sprayed outward from the suddenness of her jump. Soaking those who were still lingering on the docks. 

The flames of the massive bonfires swept staggeringly high, and the intense flickering glow cast against the expanse of her smooth, pale skin revealed to the night air still carrying a chill from the dying winter months. Beads of moisture slid off of her lithe form in a constant repetition, as she tossed her head back. Flinging the now almost waist-length sodden mass of dark hair away from her face. Using her fingers to help with the process as she slowly began to make her way down the length of the docks. Her soaked black bra and matching underwear still intact and covering their respective areas despite not having been intended for swim wear. 

She made her way up the plank wood steps. Blinking water out of her eyes, and oblivious to the way reflections of the firelight caught in the beads of water still clinging to her skin. Turning them into faint shimmering embers, that echoed in the depths of her dark eyes. A familiar crystal pendant settled on its silver chain against the place over her heart. 

In the past few months since the ordeal of dealing with the Hunters, Sophia had had plenty of time to come to terms with some of the more… unsettling aspects of the Skinwalker culture… One of those things had been nudity. 

True, everyone here (and pretty much everyone else who wasn't) had already seen the entire show back during the Meeting in which it had been necessary for her to disrobe and prove to everyone in the Pack beyond any reasonable doubt that her pelt was indeed the color she claimed it to be. It had been easier then with the threat of complete genocide hanging over them. But during the more… intimate gatherings, her still all-too-human modesty reared its disconcerting head. 

It was an aspect of her nature that Luke still couldn't resist teasing her about. Even though she had made very big strides towards being more comfortable with the concept. The first thing that she had to realize was that, although it was natural for her mind to assume that being nude around other people had a sexual significance, she wasn't human, and neither were those that she was around. And for all of them, nudity didn't necessarily mean sex. Just like being clothed didn't necessarily mean non-interest. Pack members just didn't place that much significance over what clothed their human forms. 

Despite all the suggestive and occasionally lewd banter, unless a female was either offering an invitation or already emitting aroused pheromones, the males did not attempt to initiate intercourse regardless of her state of undress, because with their constant shifting back in forth, seeing a lot of skin was typical. Normal even. The males eventually got used to programming themselves not to think of the females in that regards unless invited to, and in the, again normal, instances where they became… interested themselves, they still didn't try and force the issue with one of the females, and the unresponsive females ignored the fact that their male companions had… issues with the rules.

Of course, considering the highly hormonal nature of the Skinwalkers, very rarely were the females… unwilling. And there were no rules against males attempting to arouse the females, so long as he was careful to avoid her claws, and/or the claws of her lover in retaliation.

But regardless, Sophia had become more comfortable with being without a bunch of clothing on, simply because none of the other males were foolish enough to try and cajole her into their embraces. Not only was that an insult to her status as white female, but possibly an immediate death sentence from Luke, who would be within his every right as the alpha male of their generation to rip the throat out of any potential male rival.

And after what had happened to the last young male who had tried to come up against him in regards to Sophia, none of the others were willing to take that chance. Sophia was just glad Luke hadn't killed him, even though she wasn't exactly sure how to feel about being fought over like that. 

Weaving in-between the various bonfires, she mostly ignored the various scenes playing out around them. Having already become familiar – if not necessarily comfortable on a moral level – with the antics of her generation. Regardless of whether or not she liked it, she was their top female. One of their unofficial leaders, and as such, they were all hers. Every last one of them was under her protection. Whether they fully understood that themselves or not.

Word had circulated fast what she had been able to do for Skyler, so every time now that the Pack had a young one locked in the agonizing throes of the initial Flip, she was called upon as a last ditch effort. 

She wasn't comfortable with them all trying to make her into their guardian angel or what not. In the past four months, she had saved only four out of seven of their kind that she had been called upon to help. 

She wasn't God, and that was something she had desperately tried to impress upon everyone else from the beginning. She didn't know why she could save some and not the others, except that it simply wasn't meant to be. She wasn't a cure-all for the problems facing the Pack's youth, and she needed to make sure that they all understood that. Their species was still in serious trouble. All Sophia was capable of doing was slowing down the process by a few saved lives. But she couldn't eliminate it.

All she could do, was the best that she could with an ability that even she didn't understand. But if there was one lesson that had stuck with her from the ordeal with the now extinct – except for one – Hunters, was that she didn't have to understand something to believe in it and call it to the surface. 

Those four that she had managed to save from their early graves was proof of how well that theory was working out for her. But that was pretty much the way it always was with her unique abilities. It wasn't really herself that was controlling them. More the other way around.

Tossing her damp hair back from her face again, she secretly reveled in the sensation of the heat radiating out from the numerous flames surrounding her. Warming the liquid still clinging to her skin. Even though it was nearing the end of March, and spring – or what passed for it on the edge of the Cascades – was around the corner, there was still a considerable chill to the air… But Skinwalker tolerance and the numerous bonfires scattered everywhere beat back the chill till the temperature surrounding the area was comparable to early summer. Not that it would particularly matter regardless. She had swum well over a mile in the dead of the winter with no protective clothing, and without developing hypothermia. 

Let's hear it for Wolven genetics. 

As she cut through one particular section edging closer to the tree line – where for many the real party began – an arm suddenly wrapped securely around her waist and halted her progress sharply. Palm pressing flat against the plane of her abdomen till she was pressed firmly against the hard line of her capturer's body. But it was a body against hers she knew as intimately as her own. 

Feeling a smile curve her lips and an instant warmth begin to spread through her veins, she closed her eyes as Luke nuzzled the side of her neck. Teeth gently testing the sensitized skin. 

Another hand came up and cupped the other side of her waist. Allowing him to aggressively press his body into hers from behind. Bare skin meeting bare skin with only the minimal scraps of black lace and the slippery moisture from Sophia's dip in the lake separating them. She didn't have to look to know that he was probably completely nude, and judging by the intensely feral and exotic scent that clung to his flesh, she was also pretty sure he had just been in wolf form. That particular scent was only this strong after a shift. 

Reacting to his nearness, her hand went around to the side and her nails gently scratched up the length of his outer thigh. Feeling the strong, hard muscles ripple under the surface as she smeared his skin with the beads of water still clinging to her fingers. Small teeth scraping against her bottom lip when she felt the vibrations emitting from his chest as he growled his approval. Arousal pooling deep within her body like a living, breathing flame of desire. 

"Why don't we blow this place off, hmm? There's a place I want to show you." The hand on her hip slid up her ribcage. His slightly calloused palm rasping against the surface of her pale skin. He stopped short of one of her breasts. His fingers incredibly warm with promise as they rested there. Making her breath catch, as her eyes noticeably darkened before beginning to spark with a faint golden glow. 

His lips swept up to her jaw line, where he carefully nipped at her earlobe. Reminding her that he had just asked for her to leave with him.

The only reason she had agreed to come here tonight was to give them both a legitimate excuse to get out of the house for a while so they could be alone. Since her and Matt's house had been burnt down to the ground, and Matt had assumed leadership of the Pack, they had both been living with Vivian and Luke in the Mansion. To say that tensions had been a little high at first from the awkwardness of it all was an understatement. Matt still honestly wasn't completely comfortable with the idea of his half-human seventeen year old daughter having an unofficial mate… Of course, he was still having a difficult time seeing her as a white female as well.

But because of their situation, Sophia refused to be intimate with Luke while in that house… and to be honest, Skinwalker sense of smell being what it was, the idea of doing just that hadn't been Luke's cup of tea either. So, contrary to the belief of the rest of the Pack, they did indeed have separate rooms in the Mansion. Just as Matt and Vivian did. 

Oh, Sophia and Luke both knew that each of their last remaining parents were now mates. They had to be if Vivian was going to continue on as the official alpha bitch or lupa of the Clan. But they refrained from being intimate in the house just as Luke and Sophia did. The idea of the one pair living under the same roof as the other would have made it just a little too weird.

So, Luke and Sophia started figuring out ways around that… which is what had brought them here tonight.

Turning in his arms, she leaned up to press her mouth to his. The tip of her faceted little tongue tracing the seam of his lips teasingly. Believing that two could play at this game.

He reciprocated by running both palms down her hips to her upper thighs. Gathering them up in both hands, and lifting her up a little ways as he slid his knee upwards between them. The contact driving the breath from her body, as the movement forced her to slowly ride up on him.

Sophia pulled her mouth away from his with a gasp. Pressing her palms against his shoulders in a placating gesture. Remembering that they still had a potential audience, and as comfortable as she may have become with the eroticism freely displayed within the Pack, she drew the line at having sex in public. 

Which is exactly where this was going to go if they didn't change the scenery fast.

Nodding her consent, Sophia allowed Luke take her by the hand, and lead her into the surrounding forest. Anticipation singing hotly from within her veins. 

* * *

  


Please Review and let me know what you think!!!


	3. Where The Wild Things Play, Part Two of ...

Virtual Season Two – Episode #25

"Where The Wild Things Play" 

Part Two of Three

* * *

  


"Remind me to never get pregnant again." Ruby repeated darkly for the hundredth time as she struggled to sit up from a couch that she no longer wished to recline upon. 

John watched her with a sense of amusement over her predicament, but was intelligent enough not to let it show. He was also intelligent enough to know that if he tried to help her get up, he'd probably only withdraw from her just as fast, minus a hand.

Seeing his mate go through the hormonal stages of not only a pregnant woman, but a pregnant Skinwalker woman had definitely shown him a different side to his passionate young wife. 

And one of things that he had learned was that sometimes it was best not to do anything or say anything at all until he was sure which way her moods were going to shift.

And it was a surety very rarely in stock these days.

To say that she could be a little testy once in a while was an understatement of gigantic proportions. But again, that was a revelation that he was also smart enough to keep to himself.

"I hate being pregnant." She muttered more to herself than to him as she finally managed to get her feet under her. "There is nothing enjoyable about this entire process at all, I don't care what other women say. It's nothing but a mass conspiracy against us younger women who've never had children to convince us to conceive and therefore populate the species. 'Most incredible experience of my life', my ass."

"And to think that you still have two more months to go." John commented. 

Ruby rolled her eyes. "At least there's only two in there. But then again, if there had been more, this pregnancy would have already been over."

Skinwalker pregnancies were interesting things. Under the rare chance that there was only one fetus, the gestation period was no more than eight months. But if there were multiples – which proved to be the case more often than not – then for every baby in a multiple pregnancy, meant one less month on that standard eight month term.

So because Ruby was carrying two, it meant that her entire gestation period was speeded up to allow her to give birth sometime during the sixth month. Which basically meant to the casual observer she now looked like she was ready to pop almost any minute. But then again, the casual observer (i.e. human) wouldn't immediately think 'twins' when they looked at her either…

She both envied and pitied the women in the Clan who wound up carrying three or four babies in one shot. Yeah, that meant that their pregnancies only lasted about four or five months… but it also meant that everything was sped up… and for some of the women, it could be a totally draining experience due to the increased growth rate of their babies. Many had to submit themselves to bed-rest, and in so doing, became highly vulnerable.

Well, hell would freeze over – and then thaw and freeze again – before Ruby would allow herself to be pushed to such a decision. She had already been kept under lock and key enough for one lifetime. She wasn't going to become any more trapped by her own body if she could help it.

Pressing her hands to the small of her back, she winced as she walked over to John. Leaning into him for comfort, as he took a hint, and ran his own hands down to the pained area of her back, massaging it gently. 

"It wouldn't be so awful, if I could at least shift." She confessed grudgingly. "I miss running in the forests. I miss how it felt to be consumed by the Otherness."

John pressed a kiss to the top of her head in sympathy, even as he continued to soothingly rub the strained muscles in her back. "I know, baby. I miss running with you, too."

She picked her head up from his chest and looked up at him. "You know, you don't have to abstain from making the change yourself. I know how hard it can be to deny our other nature."

"Ruby, we've already had this discussion a hundred times by now. As long as you can't make the Change, neither will I."

"I hate not being able to flip." She admitted. "It's like I'm trapped in a prison, but the prison is my own skin. I used to be able to shed it so easily, but now I can't, and it's driving me crazy."

That was always that hardest thing for Skinwalker mothers-to-be. Once they got about a month or so into their pregnancies, and their babies began to take on noticeable human features, they could no longer make the change from their human forms to that of their Wolven ones, without the threat of severely deforming their young in the earlier stages of their term, or killing them at the later ones… and quite possibly themselves as well.

It hadn't always been like this for the Skinwalkers. They used to be able to make the Change regardless of the stage their pregnancy was at. Just like their children, once they reached puberty, had been able to Flip for that first time almost as easy as drawing breath, with not the fear of excruciating pain or the possibility of death hanging over their heads.

Proving once more that this, like all the other lessons of their kind, had to have been learned the hard way over the course of the last hundred years in Wolf Lake.

Sensing her melancholy thoughts, John sighed and reluctantly pulled away. Dropping his arms from around her torso, and taking one of her hands in his. He didn't like the shadows that he saw in her eyes. They usually meant that she was thinking too much.

"Ruby, you can't keep doing this to yourself. You can't keep worrying about what might happen. It's not healthy for you, or for the babies. And it sure as hell doesn't do any good." He paused for a moment. Peering into her face searchingly. "How 'bout we go for a walk, hmm? I think that maybe just getting outside for a little while, breathing in the night air, will help relax you some before we go to bed."

Ruby pushed her dark hair back from her face with her free hand. Teeth scraping against her bottom lip as she contemplated the possibility. "Okay," she finally breathed out, smiling faintly. "That sounds nice."

* * *

  


Ruby breathed in deeply of the cold, crisp scent of the surrounding forest as her and John moved through it. Despite her enlarged stomach, and the weight of what lay within it, she still moved over the earthen floor with pretty much the same inherent grace and agility that she had always possessed, and John watched her with a sense of wonderment over the beautiful creature at his side. They had only been officially mated (and married) for a couple of months now…

And John would have been lying if he said that he didn't still fear that one day he would wake up and find all of this a dream. 

Some of it had been hard. Some of it harder. There were still many things about the Pack he didn't understand, and many things that he didn't want to be a part of at the moment. The same piece of him that had accepted the truth of this town, was completely separate from the other piece that had him so secretly screwed up he felt more like an outsider here than ever before. Because he apparently wasn't human… but he wasn't really one of them, either.

He had been exposed to the mystique of Wolf Lake for a little over three months, right before it all had come full circle. He had seen and heard and experienced things that had completely turned his world upside down. It hadn't been that much of a stretch to actually have the truth revealed to him… That the town of Wolf Lake was controlled and primarily populated by shapeshifters. Skinwalkers. Werewolves. 

Whatever you wanted to call them, they were real… and now he possessed the very same gift that set them apart from the rest of the world.

It had been easier during those events four months ago to work around that sudden life-shattering alteration. He had just found Ruby, and they all had been so fixated on surviving, that nothing else had mattered. So what if he could shapeshift? He was a decorated cop. Surviving was something he was very good at, and utilizing his newly acquired abilities to do just that was just another facet of his personality. He could try to work his mind around whatever possible ramifications later… he had had to do whatever was necessary to keep Ruby alive and safe at that time, and falling into complete and utter denial wouldn't have done any of them any good

He still wasn't completely accepted by everyone else in the Pack. Oh, they kept their opinions to themselves, simply because of the high-ranking members of the Clan that supported John and his union to Ruby. But he was still smart enough to know that one day he would have to be the one to establish himself. One day, someone in the Pack who wasn't happy with his presence there, would bring the fight to him… and John was going to have to be willing to deal with that when the time came.

Ruby felt guilty and responsible for his decision not to shift while she couldn't… but to be perfectly honest, it was a break that he had found himself heartily welcoming. It was providing him with the time that he needed to figure out where to go from here.

Ruby paused under the shelter of one of the towering trees, and looked up the length of the steep trunk till it finally met up with the top. Viewing the night sky through the canopy of limbs and evergreen leaves. She tilted her head to the side in a familiar gesture of hers, as if she was hearing things that only she could hear. And maybe in a way she was.

It was a beautiful night. Moonlight filtered down through the branches, and cast haunting designs across their surroundings, even though the glowing orb itself wasn't visible. Tendrils of fog circled her calves with its cool, slightly damp touch and spread out across the ground. Interweaving through the trees, and glittering with the finest sheen of ice particles in the ferns and underbrush. Freezing upon the moss covered trunks of fallen trees crisscrossing across the terrain. Some had collapsed recently, while others had been dead longer than she had been alive… But even in death, life still shone stubbornly where it had taken up residence in the cracks and crevices of the ancient wood. 

The beauty surrounding them was the same beauty that called to each and every one of them. It called to them as children, and sung to them in their dreams in the days before their first Flip. It welcomed them into its embrace every night as they shed their human facades for the reality of what lay in their hearts. 

If there had ever been a place in the world that could have possessed magic, it would have been this one, for it already sung with the magic of Ruby's wolven pelted ancestors.

The forests of Wolf Lake belonged to each and every one of the members of the Pack. The Clan. It was in their blood, a part of their heritage… and to think that four months ago they had almost lost it was a hell of a lot more frightening to her now, then it had been then, with the strengthening awareness of her two babies – a little boy and a little girl – growing just a little bit more within her womb with every passing day. She suddenly understood the value of having a safe haven for their kind far more intimately than she had in her pre-pregnancy days.

She never wanted to fear again that her children might one day go without a home. A secret paradise to hide their gifts from the rest of the world. For she had gotten a harsh taste of what it meant not to have such a place when she had been in Seattle for those nine months. 

John had been her only relief from those cloistered days and nights.

Shaking away her depressing thoughts, she closed her eyes and listened to the sound of the wind whispering through the leaves towering above her, and the muted song of life flowing all about her. She sensed John slid up behind her, and she smiled welcoming, eyes still closed, as his arms circled her. His larger palms coming to rest on her stomach so he could feel the slight movements of their babies. 

"I'm getting as big as a house." She complained lightheartedly. Leaning her head back onto his shoulder and sighing contentedly.

He nuzzled the side of her neck. Brushing over her pulse with his lips in a caress. "Pregnant women are a turn on." He whispered into her ear.

She smacked at his arm. Eyes opening and glinting threateningly her lack of amusement. "Liar."

John couldn't control the grin that suddenly spread across his face. A decidedly wicked little grin that she could feel forming against the skin of her throat where his mouth was pressed. The warmth of his breath feathering over her pulse. "Okay, let me rephrase that." His words rumbled deeply in his chest. The amused vibrations clearly felt against Ruby's back. "**_This_** pregnant woman is an incredible turn on."

Her lips twitched despite her attempt to keep them from doing so. "Good answer… but you're still a dirty little liar."

John laughed, and turned her in his embrace till she was facing him. His palms came up to frame the sides of her face. Thumbs tracing the lines of her cheeks tenderly, as he gazed teasingly into her stunning silver eyes. Smile still lingering on his lips.

"I thought you liked me dirty."

Ruby's eyes widened slightly as he reminded her of what she had told him so long ago, on what they hadn't realized was their last night together in Seattle. Her smile widened at the implication, and she shook her head in disbelief. "Oh, tell me you can't possibly be thinking what I think you're thinking." 

His lips descending quickly on hers were apparently all the answer he thought she needed, as he slowly backed her up to one of the trunks. His kisses falling against her laughing mouth, and his answering chuckle unrestrained as he playfully nipped at her lower lip.

But their laughter was soon followed by the faint yet unmistakable sounds of a slightly different sort, as John sought to convince her once and for all just how attractive he found his stunningly beautiful and pregnant new wife and mate.

* * *

  


The darkened lounge and bar adjacent to the closed Diner was deserted except for the one person curled up in a large worn leather chair sitting by the massive rock fireplace all the way in the back. It was a place usually reserved for the social events of the Clan, but tonight it served a far more intimate purpose for the young woman who had come here seeking solitude for the sometimes overwhelming thoughts and emotions that she found herself confronting almost on a daily basis since the events of four months ago… especially when one conversation in particular tended to haunt her nights…

_"You're alive." she whispered in awe. Stepping closer to reach out a trembling hand to touch his cheek in disbelief. Her fingertips moved of their own violation to caress the line of his mouth. Feeling the velvet firmness of his lips beneath her touch._

_He let her touch him, but made no move to reciprocate._

_Presley's hand dropped away, and her eyes wandered over his form. Taking in his free-flowing mass of hair, dusty clothing, and what smelled faintly of blood. But not his. None of it his._

_And most importantly, the lack of that damning pendant from around his neck.___

_She brought her eyes back up meet his. Heart aching at the cold bleakness she saw reflected there… and she knew. She knew then that he had come to say goodbye._

_He was leaving her._

_In a way, he was already gone._

_Damien barely managed to keep from flinching from the pained awareness he suddenly saw blazing in her eyes, and he knew then that she understood what he had sought her out to do. Knew why he had come to her this one last time._

_"Why?"_

_ "You don't want me, Presley. You have no idea what I'm capable of doing. What I've done. Although the struggle within my mind and heart has died, there is a darkness present in my soul that will never leave me. There will always be a piece of what I used to be residing there. **Haunting** me."_

_Presley started to shake her head in denial, but Damien stopped her from trying to respond. His accent thickening till it carried that strange quality of velvet rasping over stone. "I am the last of my brethren, Presley. The only survivor left of **hundreds. **There is much I have to atone for, and I cannot do so if I remain here. If I did, you would always be at risk. There is much still left of my father's influence in this world, that has to be dealt with. There are documents that need to be destroyed. Paper trails that need to be eliminated. I can't just walk away from all that."_

_"But you'll come back, right? When you've done what you need to do, you'll come back to me?" Presley couldn't hide the slight tremor to her words, as she stood in front of him. Heart exposed. Hands fisted at her sides. Nails biting into her palms._

_Damien was silent for a moment. Searching for the right words, and at the same time, battling his own desires._

_"I don't know how long it will take," he admitted. "Or if it will ever even be enough."_

_Presley's eyes suddenly flared up challengingly._

_"Enough for what, Damien?__ For you to stop blaming yourself? Or to stop running from whatever demons you believe to be in your past?"_

_His dark eyes narrowed. "You don't know what you're talking about, Presley. What you are risking by wanting to be with me."_

_"Oh, don't I?" she shot back. "You're a liar, Damien. You're lying to me, which is bad enough, but most importantly you're lying to yourself!"_

_Damien moved so quickly, she didn't even have a chance to react. One minute they were facing each other off, and the next he had hauled her up against him. Body pressing aggressively, possessively into hers, as his gaze burned down at her in suppressed fury and passion._

_Presley didn't even wince at the strength he exhibited, but glared up into his eyes angrily. Trying to ignore the sudden flames of desire licking at her skin from the feeling of his body against hers. She couldn't believe he was doing this. Not after everything that they had been through. And she hated him for it. But more than anything, she hated the way her heart was breaking. Betraying her in a way she had never thought possible._

_"What do you want from me, Presley?" His black eyes simmered down at her. The coolness of his gaze had been chased away by the flames she saw burning there now._

_"I want the man that stood with me on that cliff overlooking that forsaken town." she shot back. "I want the man that risked his life to save all of us. I want the man that I walked with and bared my soul to! I want **you**, Damien!" She fell silent for a moment. Eyes shifting over his face as she watched his reaction to her words. She swallowed nervously, before dropping the tone of her voice down an octave._

_"And I know, without a doubt, that you want me, too." _

_His grip tightened to the point of pain. As he subtly inhaled her scent. The chemistry arching between them like a living thing, even as he sought to deny it. "Oh really? You seem to forget how easy it is for me to pretend, Presley. To be what I am not. To **feel** what I don't."_

_Presley shook her head vigorously. Throat constricting. "Not with me."_

_"**Yes, with you!**" Damien hissed. Almost shaking her to drive his point home. "Especially with you! Damn it, did you think that everything that came about, happened by chance? I **allowed** Eric to torture you. I made you think that I had rescued you, when in fact, all I was doing was following my father's orders. I played you, just as I played everyone else in my scheme to be free of my father's legacy! I implanted a microchip in you, **Presley, **so my father could track you and fall right into my hands**. **Why the hell would you think that any of the rest of what happened between us would be real?"_

_"You weren't responsible for my capture–" Presley started to deny hoarsely._

_"That's just it, I **was**. I knew about the Meeting that your Pack was having that night. I even pointed you out to Eric. He originally was gunning for Sophia, but I ordered him to select you instead for capture, before going back to the Warehouse and preparing for your arrival." His words fell like gunshots. Dashing all her hopes and emotions away harshly, like a cold, unfeeling sea against the rocks._

_Presley's face paled significantly, and Damien's grip gentled as he realized that she was finally starting to hear him. "**Yes. **Now you're finally beginning to understand. I **chose** you, to be victimized and played. I planned it all, Presley. Everything from your kidnapping to killing my father. Right down to every single moment. And I did a damn good job of it, too."_

_Presley didn't respond. But Damien watched as a single tear began its descent down the side of her silken cheek. _

_Slowly, his fingers began to loosen on their grip. Stepping away, he turned his face from her. _

_"So you see, Presley… things are never what they seem."_

_Presley felt as if someone had ripped her soul out._

_"I am the last person you should **ever** trust." He continued hoarsely. Eyes burning into hers as he turned back. _

_"Fine."__ Presley suddenly spat out. Eyes going blank as the lines of her face suddenly hardened. "You want me to believe you are a monster, Damien, fine. Then tell me once and for all… when we kissed yesterday afternoon, out on that cliff… was that all part of your **plan? **Your act? Did you feel **nothing? **Do you feel nothing when you are with me?**"**_

****

_He just stood there. Watching her helplessly. Not moving. Not speaking._

_But his silence gave her the answer she sought, and she knew understood more than he wanted her to, what he was trying to accomplish by speaking to her thus._

_Presley nodded in dawning awareness. Lips twisting up mockingly. "You see? Now **you're** beginning to understand **me**. You can say whatever you want. Do whatever you want. You can try to push me away by revealing to me everything that you just did, but in the end, it **doesn't matter**. You need me, Damien. Because I'm the only one that has ever seen who you really are... And that scares the hell out of you."_

_Damien visibly flinched. Breath exiting raggedly as the impact of her words._

_Not trusting himself to respond, he took a step back. Black, haunting eyes tracing over her features one last time, before he turned around and walked away._

_Presley watched the lines of his retreating back. The suppressed tears finally beginning to slide down her face. A small hand pressing against her chest almost in an attempt to keep the sensation of her heart being ripped out at bay, as a silent sob caught in her throat as she watched him disappear into the shadows of the forest, and out of her life…  _

**(Soundtrack Suggestion – "Do What You Have To Do" by Sarah McLachlan and from the album "Surfacing" )**

No matter how hard she tried, no matter how much she hated herself for her inability to get over him, or how she struggled to go on in her life as if nothing out of the ordinary had ever happened to her, she still couldn't quite do it. She still couldn't quite keep herself from falling into these… moments. Where she was forced to find some form of solitude away from the rest of the Pack. Away from friends and family that could and would never understand what it was she had so far been enduring so silently.  

_//...What ravages of spirit, conjured this temptuous rage…?//_

Five months ago, she had been the alpha bitch of her generation. Five months ago, she had been the only female suitable at that time of being the potential mate to the Alpha's son, after she had seen to it that all of her competition had... moved on to better hunting grounds. 

_//…Created you a monster, broken by the rules of love…//_

Five months ago she had known exactly what she had wanted out of life amongst her Clan. And whom she wanted that life to be with. She had been confident, ambitious, and more than a little self-centered as a result.

But then all of that had shattered to the four winds the moment she had been captured by the enemy, and then horrifically tortured over the course of several days.

_//…And fate has led you through it… you do what you have to do…//_

And the irony of all of that was, that the same person responsible for having her tortured, was the same person she couldn't forget… Even though he had apparently forgotten all about her.

_//…And fate has led you through it… you do what you have to do…//_

There had been many nights that she had woken from the nightmares. What had been done to her while in the hands of Damien's fellow Hunters was something that had scarred her deeply. Both emotionally and physically. It had been a rape of sorts. A violation. It was the only comparison that she could come up with that even came close to what it had been. They had stripped her of all her gifts and strengths, had beaten and smashed and bloodied her senseless. Even when she had told them everything that they had wanted to know, the agony hadn't ended.

And it didn't end… at least, not until Damien had intervened. 

She still remembered the sense of black rage rolling off of him, despite the apparent loss of her Skinwalker abilities. And even though she hadn't been able to see very clearly, she still heard clearly in her head the sound of her torturer's body hitting the wall on the other side of the room as he was thrown away from her.

In some ways she couldn't help but secretly wish that he had just left her alone. That he had just left her to die in the hands of one of brethren… It would have been better than having to suffer being what his leaving had reduced her to.

Yes, she had had the nightmares of her capture and resulting abuse... But she had already lost count of the times where she had cried herself to sleep from the memories that he had left her with those four months ago, when he had turned his back on her that morning after such a horrible night, and had disappeared out of her life as suddenly – and almost just as brutally – as when he had entered it.

_//…And I have the sense to recognize, that I don't know how to let you go…//_

She had never cried before she had met him. Never. She hated him for just that alone. But also for what it was like for her without him there with her. How the hell could she become so enraptured with him in such a short time? How had be managed to work his way so deeply into her heart that she couldn't get him out even though she had tried? 

_//…Every moment marked with apparitions of your soul…//_

She had always been in control with her relationships before. She had never allowed herself to fall victim to another. It was just simply the way she was. The way she had always been. But since Damien had left, this yawning emptiness in her heart just seemed to get bigger and bigger with every passing night that he didn't come back. Every night that she spent wondering if when she woke up if she'd find him sitting in her room like he had been all that time ago.

_//…I'm ever swiftly moving… trying to escape this desire…//_

It had changed her drastically. Even though she was still technically one of the top ranking young females of the Pack, she showed no interest in the antics of her group that had once entertained her. And despite the interest of many different males – including Sean who had once upon a time been a regular in her bed – she had refused to take a lover. 

She knew that there were those that were concerned about her behavior, but then again, she wasn't the only one with issues after the events of four months ago. So they all just figured that she was no different. No one really knew what had happened, except for maybe Sophia… but that didn't help Presley any because, despite what they had endured together, Sophia was really the last person that she wanted to see at the moment. 

_//…The yearning to be near you… I do what I have to do…//_

She wondered for the hundredth time if this constant cycle of need and loneliness would ever be over. She wondered if she would ever be able to get on with her life. If she would ever be able to put all of this behind her once and for all, and actually make it through one night without waking up with the taste of his mouth on her lips, and the imagined feel of his hands against her skin.

_//…The yearning to be near you… I do what I have to do…//_

She couldn't take it anymore. Every time she woke up from such dreams, and the realization hit her that that was all that they were, the pain that she thought she had done such a good job of disguising came flooding back to the surface, till her heart felt like it was trapped in someone's ever tightening fist. 

_//…But I have the sense to recognize, that I don't know how to let you go…//_

Resting her chin on her knees that she was currently hugging to her chest, Presley stared into the hypnotic flickering firelight burning steadily in front of her. Willingly her mind to just simply go blank for a few moments of hopefully blessed forgetfulness.

_//… I don't know how to let you go…//_

The glow from the frames echoed in her light colored eyes, and caught the golden highlights of her hair which trailed down about the sides of her face, unnoticed. 

_//…A glowing ember… burning hot… burning slow…//_

Slowly the tears began to rise, even though she refused to blink. Refused to let them go. It wasn't going to be that easy. She wasn't going to be defeated without a fight. She wouldn't let him do this to her. She **_couldn't_** let him do this to her. 

_//…deep within I'm shaken by the violence of existing for only you…//_

Even though she feared it was already too late.

_//…I know I can't be with you… I do what I have to do…//_

He was the one who had left her. He was the one who had turned his back on everything that she had offered to him… Everything that they would have had together. He had been the one to walk away. 

So now she would just have to learn to deal with that.

_//…I know I can't be with you… I do what I have to do…//_

And she could only pray that wherever he was, he was enduring the same agony that she was. Hopefully more. Because he was the one who deserved it. Not her. Not when she had been willing to give up everything to keep him at her side. 

She hoped he suffered and burned and hungered every single time he closed his eyes at night. She hoped she haunted him as much as he was haunting her. She hoped he starved for the taste of her, and the feel of her skin under his fingertips. She hoped he regretted having never joined his body with hers, and she prayed the he was cursed with the vision of her face every time that he even so much as thought of doing just that with another.

She hoped that she had shattered him as thoroughly as he had shattered her. 

_//…And I had the sense to recognize…//_

And as long as he chose to never come back, she prayed that he would never be able to pick up the pieces. That he would never truly be complete again.

_//…but I don't know how to let you go…//_

Because that was the life he had abandoned her to without her consent. That was what he had cost her. Cost them both…

_//…I don't know how to let you go…//_

And that was why the tears she had been trying to hold back finally began to fall. Glittering with the reflection of the shower of sparks that flew up in the fireplace as one of the glowing, burning logs shifted, popped, and cracked in two. 

* * *

  


Sophia laughed breathlessly as Luke pulled her through the trees easily at a break-neck speed. They both flowed through the forest like quicksilver over the surface of a mirror. Pouring over logs, rock formations, and uneven ground effortlessly. Following the rhythms of a dance with no particular steps, but still coursing with such incredibly primitive, sensual movement.

And she loved every second of it.

"Where are we going?" her tone sparkling from the healthy dose of mischief that had risen in response to Luke's playfulness. 

"You'll see." He called back to her. Hand still firmly clenched around hers as he helped her down a particularly steep slope. Making a left turn, he took her around one particularly massive and towering rock formation covered in moss and natural debris… and then came to a sudden stop.

Sophia landed against his unmoving back. Giggling helplessly as she did so. He reached around with one arm to steady her, a grin spreading across his face as he turned his head around to quickly press a his lips to hers while her chin was resting on the line of his shoulder. She responded enthusiastically till he broke it off. Once again taking her hand. This time an edge of seriousness bleeding over into the sensual heat burning in his eyes.

"Come on. I want to show you something."

Still panting a little from their energetic run, she obligingly allowed him to lead her deeper into the increasingly darkened shadows of this unfamiliar location.

Coming to its edge, he went right. Bringing them to another steep drop made entirely out of sheer rock. 

Giving her hand a reassuring squeeze right before he let it go, he quickly made the jump. Landing easily on both feet about forty feet below her.

Turning to look up at her, his eyes glinted gold in the heavy shadows as he beckoned her down.

"Come on. It's safe… for us."

_For our kind,_ was left unspoken but nonetheless apparent between them, and Sophia let out a deep breath. Eying the drop a little warily. 

But her curiosity was simply just too great to try to turn back now. Muscles that she wouldn't have had if she had been just a mere human began to ripple and bunch with tension as she judged the distance… and leapt.

A moment of the sensation of being airborne, of her heart flooding up into her throat, and the automatic wonderment about whether or not the strange sensation of being weightless would continue on forever… and then she landed firmly in front of Luke. Legs bending at the knees to absorb the shock. 

Luke's hands immediately steadied her, even though it wasn't necessary.

Smiling broadly at him, she couldn't help but then turn a little dazedly to look at the height from which she had just jumped from, and felt almost a childlike sense of accomplishment and pride at the feat she had just achieved.

Luke took the moment to press his lips into the curve of her bare shoulder. Sending a jolt through her body at the sudden contact and reminding her of the reason why they had come out here in the first place.

"You ready to see my surprise?"

She turned back to look at him, dark eyes glimmering with desire. Nodding an affirmative.

* * *

  


Please take a moment to review and tell me your thoughts!!


	4. Where The Wild Things Play, Part Three o...

Virtual Season Two – Episode #25

"Where The Wild Things Play" 

Part Three of Three

**(Soundtrack Suggestion – "Come Away With Me" by Norah Jones, and from the album "Come Away With Me" ) **

"I have to admit," Vivian whispered softly against the curve of Matt's shoulder where she had lain her cheek against. "I'm a little rusty at this. It's definitely been awhile."

He smiled and pressed a reassuring kiss to the top of her head. "You're doing fine. Besides, you're not the only one who is a little nervous. I can't even remember the last time I did this."

Vivian closed her eyes. Lips curving faintly, as she cuddled closer. "I don't want this to end. Think we can keep this up for a little while longer?"

Matt chuckled. "I'm not going anywhere. We have the entire night ahead of us."

Vivian made a sound of contentment as he ran his hands down the curve of her spine. Pressing into the small of her back as they continued to sway to the beat of a soft jazz love song filtering out from the interior of the Mansion through the open sliding doors, which lead out to the spacious wrap-around porch that had just been turned into their dance floor. 

Stars glittered above them like vibrant diamonds cast against a black silk cloth, and the moon shone brightly. It's light pure and beautiful as it lit up the expanse of jagged, snow-capped mountains and surrounding forests that made up their view and their world. 

They were still dressed up from their date. Matt was still in his suit, and Vivian was still in her silk dress made up of several different hues of amethyst and lavender. But their dress shoes had long ago been kicked off in favor of dancing barefoot across the smooth wood planks beneath their feet. 

"I enjoyed tonight." Vivian admitted conversationally. Eyes still closed as she breathed in deeply of her new mate's scent. "Everything has been so crazy the last few months… It was so wonderful to actually relax for an evening, and not have to worry about anything."

"Yes, it was." Matt agreed. Enjoying the feel of Vivian's arms wrapped around his neck. Fingers resting against his nape. 

He'd been the official Alpha of the Pack for four months now, and the transition had been pretty seamless in its lack of traditional bloodshed. He had made sure of that. There had never been a doubt in his Clan's mind about what repercussions would befall them if anyone tried to turn his ascension into a civil war.

Matt was the leader that most of them had wanted seventeen years ago… Well, they had him now. And they all knew it. Now he was just waiting to see who would make the first threatening move in challenge of his position. 

So far, it had been a quiet wait. But a big influence in that quietness had to do with the fact that most of those that would have challenged him were either dead or gone. Malachi, Stokes, and Gerald – all dominant males of the Old Guard – had been killed, along with Stokes and Gerald's sons. The only potential two rivals were Tyler and Malachi's son.

Tyler was MIA… they hadn't seen nor heard anything about him since the events of four months ago… he had disappeared from Wolf Lake, and hadn't even taken anything with him. Matt knew it was only a matter of time before he came back, but for now, he didn't think it was an issue he was going to have to confront anytime soon. 

Malachi's son, however, was a completely different scenario, and one that he had been discussing at length with Vivian tonight over dinner.

When Malachi was killed, and the future of the Clan was up for grabs, Julian – just turned twenty – had been smart enough to disappear long before his father's impaled body had even turned cold. And he had been long gone by the time the election had rolled around. 

He had gone up north, over the border into Canada, and had remained there for the past six months. But now, word had finally reached him via a loyal supporter of his deceased father that Matt was now in control of the Clan, and that it would be safe for the young heir to the Old Guard leadership to return. 

But the acceptance of Julian back into the fold wasn't going to be seamless. He would be the youngest pack member to ever have control of the Old Guard, and even though it was a group that Matt didn't approve of, it was still a critical part of the Wolf Lake Clan.

The Old Guards were their solders. Their army. The most brutal of their kind. They had a different set of beliefs, of handling things. Keeping to themselves, living by the ways of their ancestors, and isolated from the rest of the Pack. 

They did the things that none of the others wanted to know about or do. They handled the situations that none of the others were willing to touch. 

Handling the problems that no one else even so much as caught wind of.

They were the proverbial power behind the throne… the stiletto in the dark. And as Alpha to the Pack, it was critical that Matt have their support. But he was already on shaky ground with them for giving the order to evacuate Wolf Lake four months ago in the face of the Hunters' aggression and technology, when it had been apparent that they had wanted to stay and fight. Despite being weakened by not having their strongest of leaders to guide them. 

Julian was Malachi's son. He had been raised with the knowledge that one day he would replace his father. He had been trained in the old ways of their kind that were now considered too barbaric except for the most extreme positions within the Pack. Matt was concerned about whether or not Julian would be loyal, or if he would carry a grudge against him for the same reasons that the other members of his tribe did… Or if maybe his possible disloyalty would stem from the same flavor that his father had possessed.

Malachi had been against Matt's marriage to a human. And he had heartily disapproved of Matt giving away his right to lead the Pack after Marie's death. He hadn't been pleased with the idea that their strongest male, and the shoe-in for Alpha, had thrown it all away because of a promise he had made to his dying wife, just days after their Alpha of over thirty years had died, and the war amongst the Clan had begun. He had thought Matt a coward and a weakling and that he had turned his back on his Clan when it had been at its greatest hour of need.

There had been a lot of hostility between Matt and Gerald… and Matt was sure that that had to have bled over to his son at some point or another. He was just going to have to wait and see whether or not Julian was going to seek to be just like his father, or if he would be strong enough to be his own person, and choose whether or not there would be war between them as well.

He hoped that it wouldn't. After everything that they had been through, the last thing that Matt wanted to see was the Pack falling back into civil war. Their numbers had dwindled far too low as it was, what with the last war before Willard's ascension, then the resulting loss of far more children than ever before, what with an even thinner gene pool to work with, and then the blow of the Hunters in which valuable breeding mated pairs had been lost… They couldn't afford another war. 

Because if that is what lay on the horizon for Wolf Lake, then what remained of the Skinwalkers wouldn't survive to see the birth of the next century. There would just be a silent graveyard of torn apart corpses and lost half-flipped children to mark their passing.

"You're doing it again." Vivian chastised gently. Eyes opening slightly. "You're thinking about things you have no business thinking about while you're holding me in your arms during such a perfect moment."

"I'm sorry."

Vivian lifted her head up to look at him. Expression soft and inviting. "Don't be. Expecting you not to worry about the future of our people would be like expecting the sun not to come up tomorrow."

"I'm just… concerned… Concerned about whether or not I'm doing the right thing by allowing Julian to come back home."

Vivian rested her chin against his chest, eyes trailing over the strong column of his throat revealed by the open top of his crisp white dress shirt. "We won't really know where he stands till he does come back. Besides, I've told you before. Julian never particularly struck me as a Malachi clone. He always seemed far more intelligent than he let on. I mean, he was quiet because he was smart enough to know that the longer you remained invisible to the rest of the Clan, the quicker it became easier for you to remain as such… Even though he might have been standing right in front of them. That can be a powerful tool in the right hands." Vivian paused. "Where is he now? Did he say?"

"He'll be crossing over the border in two days… he'll be back in town by the end of the week."

"Well then, I guess we'll just have to wait and see whether or not his allegiance we fall to you. He will be a powerful ally if so."

"Or a dangerous enemy if not." Matt pointed out. Wrapping his arms tighter around her as they continued to dance.

Vivian turned her head and pressed her cheek back against his chest. Slender hands running over the back of his shoulders reassuringly.

~*~*~*~  

Sophia knew that standing there with her mouth ajar was probably not the proper response, but for an extended moment in time, it was the best she could do as she gazed upon Luke's handiwork. The answer to the mystery of where he had gone off to in wolf form while she had taken her swim was revealed.

He had brought her to the mouth of a cave, carved into the side of what was the foundation of what could either be referred to as a small mountain or a massive hill… but it wasn't so much the unfamiliar cave as it was the interior.

Her lover had been apparently been a very busy boy.

The cave's interior didn't stretch very far… only about 200 feet into the rock, and it was less than 100 feet wide. And the only way she was able to know that, was partially because of the small fire banked low and burning close enough to the opening that the small amount of smoke was able to drift out of the mouth and into the night air.

As nice as it was though, the fire wasn't the reason for her stunned silence… the dozens of lit candles scattered throughout however, were.

She felt Luke come up right behind her, and had the presence of mind to finally shut her mouth as his arms encircled her waist, and his lips brushed over her temple.

"Do you remember right after my father had his stroke in the Diner, and the Rave that I brought you to?"

Sophia frowned slightly. "Uh, you mean the one where you got drunk and acted like a total jackass, and then I tried to go home and got kidnapped by Nancy?" She turned around in his arms enough to give him a look. "Gee, I don't remember that at all."

"Remember me telling you then that I knew of this great place that I wanted to take you to?"

Sophia's eyes narrowed. "You're not exactly winning any points here with this conversation, Luke."

Luke continued, ignoring her comment. "Well, consider this my making it up to you. This was the place I wanted to bring you that night… even though the timing hadn't been right."

"And you were drunk." Sophia added firmly.

"And I was drunk." Luke repeated in agreement. Eyes darkening slightly. "If I hadn't been drinking, I would have remembered who had picked you up that night on the highway, and I could have told your father. Also, if I hadn't already been drunk when going to her salon, I would have picked up on your scent… and not just the lingering one that would have been left from your visit there a couple days prior." He craned his head around enough to meet her gaze with his. "Notice how I don't drink around you anymore."

Sophia snorted. "You and I are hardly ever apart."

Luke kissed the top of her head. "Exactly."

Sophia gave him one last look, before relenting and turning back around. Curious, she slowly pulled away, wanting to explore the interior a little closer. He let his arms drop from around her waist, and shadowed her from just a few feet away.

She felt it when she crossed its threshold. The power. The energy. It tickled over her skin and raised the fine hairs on the back of her neck. Surprised, she turned to look at Luke.

"What is this place?"

His lips curved upwards faintly. Shadows cast by firelight dancing in his eyes. "It's been a secret place for the Clan for as long as our kind have been in this town. A lot of our people have embraced their duel nature here."

Sophia turned her head away and walked further into the cave… and it hit her right in the gut. 

It wasn't necessarily painful, but it was an unusual sensation. She should have been panicked at the feel of it sinking into her. Touching places within her that were decidedly not human. She gasped slightly as a second wave of power poured over her. Soaking into her skin. She had never felt anything quite like it… except when she Flipped. And even then, it wasn't this strong.

"You mean this is where couple came to…" Sophia's question trailed off as she stopped. Closing her eyes for a moment and trying to take in shallow breaths when she began to sway slightly. Steadying herself up against the energy that seemed to permeate the very air, filling her lungs, and finding yet another way into her body by coursing through her blood stream.

Luke thought she had stopped speaking because she was embarrassed about the nature in which this cave had been used. She felt him come closer to her, although he didn't make contact. 

"You don't mind me having brought you here, do you?" he asked, concern in his voice. "I don't want you to think that this place is the equivalent of an over-used motel room or something… that's not it at all. It has a very special meaning for the Pack. I don't know… something to do with it being at the heart of our territory or something. It's open to the embrace of our forests, and to our animal nature." He paused hesitantly. "It's where you should have been when you Flipped."

Sophia heard him but she didn't respond. He sighed. Taking her silence to mean unhappiness.

"I'm sorry. I thought you would enjoy coming here. But we can leave if you're not comfortable, it not a big de – "

Sophia's eyes shot open and she flung her hand out. Grabbing his arm to halt him from walking away. "No. That's not it at all. I want to stay. It's just…"

Luke looked at her oddly. "It's just what?"

Sophia let go of his arm and both of her hands swept outward. Encompassing the interior. "Can't you feel it?" she asked. Finally feeling a little more steady on her feet. "There's… power here. A hell of a lot of it, too."

Luke looked around. "Well… hundreds of our ancestors have flipped here. You of all people know what that Otherness feels like when it bursts along the skin for that first time."

"This is different, though." Sophia commented. Walking over to the naturally formed surface of the surrounding walls. "It's like the surrounding rock and even the ground under our feet have been soaked in it." She pressed her palm against the cool stone. Feeling the rough texture under her skin. "I can feel it."

And she could. Somehow or other, in this place she was connected to the past, present, and future. She could sense the hundreds – indeed thousands – that had Flipped within this chamber in the last two hundred years. She could sense the passion and eroticism of couples coming together for the first time… the agony of the experience as their bodies were literally ripped apart from the insides in order to give birth to their second forms… The incredible power that would come in a wash of glowing light, clinging to their new  furs… Their joy of succeeding successfully, and the rapture of slipping off into the surrounding forests in order to explore this new world that had just been opened up to them… 

It was enough to make her eyes burn from the emotion it invoked from within her, but it was what lay under that, that caused the tears to gather. There was a darker, more subtle undertone resting there… the by-product of the youth that didn't make it. A failure becoming more and more common as the decades passed.

She could feel the agony of bodies rejecting themselves… Of minds pushed to the breaking point… Of lovers screaming out their pain as their mates died in their arms, or at the hands of their Alpha… 

It was all here. The good… and the bad.

And this place had soaked up the experiences like a sponge.

It had always been an ongoing discussion amongst the members of the Pack to discuss the idea of magic clinging to the forests of Wolf Lake… Not that the actual forest itself was magical, mind you, but because of the people within it that had been making the Change and running in their wolf skins for over two hundred years, that the by-product of that shift must cling in some way or other to their surroundings. 

Sophia herself had never been sure if she believed in all of that, or if it was just a pretty little thought… But now, standing in this place, she had no doubt. It literally throbbed and pulsed with the awakening of thousands to their Otherness. Regardless of whether or not that awakening brought them new life or only death.

"Sophia?"

Sophia blinked… and yanked her hand away from the wall as if burned. Cradling it to her chest, she slowly backed away. Stopping after about ten feet.

"Sophia, what's wrong?"

She shook her head. "Nothing. Nothing at all. It's just… this place is a little overwhelming."

"Sophia, I'm not sensing anything."

She smiled secretively at that. Slowing dropping her hands back to her side. "No, you wouldn't. No one would. It's me. It's only me. I'm probably the only one who can sense it… Just like I'm the only one who can sometimes force those in arrest to complete their Flip."

Luke came up beside her. Tucking a stray lock of hair back behind her ear. "You think there is some sort of magical quality to what you do?"

She shook her head. "No, nothing that dramatic… I don't know how to describe it, Luke. When I'm with one of them, it's like I can call out to their inner wolves. Actually achieve a mind link, just like I would do with any of our kind. I can convince them to come to the surface. Sometimes it doesn't work. Sometimes they are just too far gone, and too far buried under their twisted humanoid bodies… But it's a lot like coaxing out a reluctant animal with a piece of meat. They always want to come… it's just that sometimes they aren't sure how to go about it."

She began to walk along the cavern's wall. Studying all the ancient looking candles mounted into the walls, and the beads of wax that dripped down their slender bodies to harden at varying levels in the rock crevices. She had to step carefully to avoid the ones scattered about on the floor. Sitting in their holders as they burned steadily. Flickering only from the slight stirring of air currents caused by her and Luke's movement about the cavern. 

"It's almost like I'm connecting to all of the ones that have come here to Flip. And I know that's crazy, because I know it's just the imprint of the wolven pheromones released during the first Change that have collected here over the centuries… but that is still the way it feels. Because I'm sensing those, I'm also connecting to the emotions felt by those individuals at that particular time. It's a little… chaotic." But she knew how to deal with it. It was simple child's play in comparison to what she had done four months ago in order to save the Pack and destroy the Hunters.

"This is where you Flipped, isn't it? This is where you made the Change for the first time."

Luke nodded slowly. "Unlike some of the other members of the Pack, my father new forgot the knowledge of this place, or the purpose it served. He wasn't going to risk losing his only son and heir without having provided me with everything he could think of to help me survive when the time came."

Sophia frowned. "You were thirteen. So young…"

Luke sighed. "You know as well as I do, Sophia, that the older we get, the more dangerous it become to attempt to merge into that other world. I was too important to the Pack to be allowed time to mature by human standards. My Flip was a ritual immersed in the ancient traditions of the Clan to give me all the leverage possible. It was definitely not a casual – or private – experience."

She nodded distractedly, as if she wasn't paying attention to what he had said. But she had heard every word, and had filed it away for further examination. The Pack turning their backs on the ways of the Old down through the recent decades might explain a portion of their current predicament. 

Luke grasped her by the arm and turned her around to face him. Forcing her to look at him. "Are you going to be okay, or do we need to leave?"

Sophia smiled reassuringly at him. Stepping closer to him to press her palms against his bare chest, she watched as the play of darkened shadows and golden light danced across his beautiful nude body and features. Knew that he was watching a similar show taking place on her own skin. Highlighted by the black bra and underwear still gracing her form.

In that moment, their surroundings took on an entirely different meaning, as she remembered the reason why they had come out here in the first place.

Sliding one hand up the centerline of his chest, she encircled the back of his neck… and brought his lips down to hers.

~*~*~*~ 

It was entering well into the darkest hours of the night. Vivian had already changed into her nightgown and was perched on the edge of the chair pulled up to her vanity, brushing her hair, when Matthew knocked on her door.

Surprised, a small knowing smile flitted across her lips as she placed the brush back down on the vanity top, threw an arm over the back of her chair, and turned just in time to see him open the door to enter her room. 

But any thoughts she might have had about his unexpected visit evaporated when she saw his expression.

"Matt? What is it? What's wrong?"

"I just got a call from Molly. I'm going to have to go in tonight. There's been a murder. Actually, two murders."

Vivian slowly came to her feet. A look of concern spreading over her features. "Who were they?"

Matt visibly swallowed. "A young couple. Human. They were out-of-towners, just here visiting some family that live in town. They went for a walk one morning and never came back. They found their bodies behind the Brewery." He paused, as if unsure how to continue. "Molly said that the bodies were half eaten." 

Vivian closed her eyes, and let out a breath. "It was one of ours, then." She looked back up to Matt for confirmation. "It was a Skinwalker."

Matt didn't answer, but he didn't need to. 

The silence was answer enough.

~*~*~*~

Shadows danced with the golden light from the surrounding pinpoints of firelight flickering within their depths. Darkness crept along the rock surface of the walls and ceiling of the cavern, settling thickly in the corners farthest from the multiple sources of glowing candles. The small fire closer to its entrance was still burning steadily. As the flames licked at the wood fueling it, the sounds of popping and crackling echoed within the cavern's expanse. Intermingling with the faint sounds of passion beginning to ignite in the hearts and bodies of the couple intertwined at the very center of the naturally formed room. A couple unaware of how their own shadows cast against the rock wall behind them had melded erotically with each other. Depicting their intimate foreplay in a startlingly primitive contrast. 

Sophia was straddling Luke's lap where he had tugged her down upon after first kneeling in the nest of furs gathered at the center of the cavern. It had been something that had escaped her scrutiny upon first entering this place, although how, she wasn't exactly sure.

It was a bed, for lack of a better term, that was made up of pelts. It was the fur that had covered the prey that had fallen under the claws of the Skinwalkers. 

Their were hundreds of them, potentially thousands, and it covered at least a twenty by twenty foot section, at least four foot thick. Some were old. Older than the couple currently resting on them combined… Some were newer, and still carried the scent of the animals that they had once belonged to. Large and small, of varying textures and colors, she couldn't help but marvel at the collection.

Despite how her human morals might have protested the mass amount of the furs, she wasn't completely human. And she couldn't find it within herself to even be the slightest bit guilty. Not while in this place. She was a wolf at heart, after all. They were predators, and Wolf Lake provided the hunting grounds that became necessary at different times in a Skinwalker's life. The hunt, the kill, and the feast were all a part of their Other nature. And there was no shame in that.

Besides, the feel of the various furs rubbing up against her body, surrounding her in warmth and the reminder of who and what she was… it was a powerful aphrodisiac, and she understood yet again why this place had become such a valuable secret to the Pack.

This was a place of magic and the miracle of that first Flip. It had once been a necessary part of every young member of the Clan. But over the years human morality had stolen into their people's lives, and they no longer wanted to press their children to come to this place when the time came to Flip. Thinking that it was too barbaric a practice. Too ritualistically heavy with potential sacrifice. Not fully understanding that that decision might have cost them so many fragile lives.

She didn't want to think about how many of their kind they might have saved if they had held to that ancient tradition, instead of turning their backs on it. Leaving most of their children to struggle in the darkness of uncertainty and ignorance. She didn't want to think that in their desire to be more like the humans and leave the Old Ways behind them, they had let their pride get in the way of their offspring's – and their species – survival. 

Sophia tilted her head back as Luke ran the heat of his mouth down the curve of her throat. Running the tip of his tongue over her pulse, and pinching the tender skin over her collarbone gently between his teeth at the same time both of his palms cupped her lower hips and pulled her closer.

A small cry came from her parted lips, and her hands clenched where they rested on his back shoulders. The tips of her nails digging firmly into the soft skin overlaying rock-hard strength as she gave herself over to his ministrations. They had been lovers for five months, and although it had always been incredible between them, they had had a lot of time to find out what pleasured the other the most. The secret places on each other's bodies that were unique only to them, and revealed only to each other. 

One thing that would never change for their people was their highly sexual nature. And communication amongst lovers didn't necessarily mean talking. In fact, it very rarely ever did. When you are dealing with a species that rely on their senses to tell them everything they need to know, it's impossible to keep anything secret from your mate. It could be a very beneficial – if albeit a frightening experience at times – to know that there was somebody out there that knew your body as intimately – if not more so – than you did.

She could feel him long and thick and perfect, pressing into her lower body, as the junction of her thighs continued to burn with increasing arousal. The thin scrap of satin that passed for underwear still clung to her body, even though her bra and had ago been cast aside.

Pulling his mouth away from her neck, his glowing gaze met hers for a spilt second before he kissed her, and slipped between her parted lips to stroke deeply inside her mouth. She could feel the muscles of his in his mouth, his jaw, his neck working as he held her, pressed into her, explored her... Possessed her. He moved inside her mouth the way she imagined that he would move inside her body, and a sound rose in her throat at the sensations it invoked. As if with every movement of his tongue against hers, he tugged upon a shining, slender filament tied directly to the pleasure zones of her body… and with every tug, he forced something within her to tighten hotter and hotter till she couldn't help but cry out against the pressure of his mouth against hers.

A growl erupted from his throat, and his hands slid lower. Cupping her derriere and tilting her backwards. Letting her fall into the thick nest of pelts beneath them.

She landed against them, all pale skin and shining eyes surrounded by the furs. He followed her down, and the view of his body leaning over hers took her breath away. His hands pulled forward slightly till they came to her hips, and stroked under the thin black straps resting there. The feel of his slightly calloused fingers running over the tender skin caused her to set her teeth into her bottom lip, and when she both felt and heard the cloth rip with a sound that only wet silk could make, she had to restrain the soft, inarticulate cry that rose in her tightening throat, or the way that her body moved restlessly underneath his. Knowing that the only barrier that separated them now was nothing but thin air and the magic of anticipation.

His eyes glowed more vibrantly than any candle that surrounded them, and the shadows of firelight mimicked the flames she saw in those passionate depths as they danced over the glorious expanse of her body. 

She had many images of Luke that would forever be imprinted upon her heart… but there would always be a part of her that would always see him just like this. Sexually charged and desire ridden. Dominate and gentle. Primitive and adoring. 

The surface of his skin rippled with suppressed inhuman strength as he rose aggressively over her. Taking her hands in both of his, fingers intertwining, and pinning them relentlessly above her head. Holding her there. 

His lips came down to hers, his kiss gentle and loving. At odds with the raw animal aggression raging through his body. The contradiction was almost enough to bring a smile to her lips as she kissed him back. Almost. She knew all too well what a potent combination that made in him.

Feeling her body arch underneath his, he worked a path down the line of her curved throat. The sensation of that mouth and teeth and tongue working against her sensitive skin was pure torment. 

He pulled his mouth away reluctantly, and looked down at her. Really looked at her. Stretched out beneath him, revealed and open. 

A faint smile curving his mouth as the firelight danced in his inhuman eyes. Sophia smiled back, breath catching a little bit as she saw in his gaze the effect the sight of her was having on him. Loving the sensation of his fingers running between hers above her head tenderly.

"This is it." He whispered hoarsely. "This is the vision that I want to see the night following our own mating ceremony. This is where I want us to be when we come together for the first time as official mates, and complete the bonding process." One of his hands untangled itself from hers and came down to stroke the side of her face. Fingers tracing over her cheekbone and jaw-line tenderly. "This is where I want to spend that night with you."

Sophia blinked. Of all the things she had been expecting him to say, this possibility hadn't even been a remote consideration. On one hand, she almost wanted to cry at the beauty of his words and the love that she saw in his eyes… but on the other…

Luke's focus suddenly sharpened, and he looked at her a little closer. Suddenly serious. "I told you four months ago that I would give you time to think about it. Time for everything to sink in, and for you to become comfortable with your new position in the Pack, and with me. I also told you, that the day would come that I would ask you again, and I would want your answer."

Sophia's eyes widened slightly, and her lips parted even though it took a couple of tried before anything came out. "You're asking me again here? Now?"

One brow rose a fraction. "Can you think of a better time?"

Sophia blinked again a couple of times. Trying desperately to gather her thoughts. "I-It just seems like such a big step."

Luke frowned. "And what we've done together already wasn't?"

Sophia shook her head. "No, I didn't mean that."

Now Luke just looked confused. "What exactly did you mean? I thought you were comfortable now, with everything."

"I just… don't see a reason to rush into it, that's all. What's wrong with just taking it slow for awhile longer? What wrong with just keeping things the way they are?"

He went completely still and just looked at her. She could see his shock at her obvious refusal. As if uncertain that he was having this conversion with the right person. Sophia groaned inwardly. Not liking this turn of events.

Wanting to remedy the situation, Sophia tried again to convince him. "I love being with you, Luke. I love everything about our relationship. I just don't want any of that to change, that's all. And it shouldn't. It'll be so much easier this way. You know it, and I know it. Mating ceremonies among the youngest of the Pack don't exactly happen every day, even with those who are bonded, like we are. So I don't see why we can't just be content with what we have for right now, and forget about the rest."

Luke cocked his head to the side, eyes staring unwaveringly into hers. She looked back at him uncertainly. Tension beginning to gather in her stomach. She didn't like the look she saw rising in his eyes at that moment.

But before she had a chance to decipher it, he surprised her. Again.

Before she had a chance to contemplate any of it, his lips descended back onto hers. And she knew something had just happened. A line had just been crossed. Something critical had just changed, altering her future, although she'd be damned if she knew what it was.

But it wasn't going to take long before the answer was revealed to her, as she was about to find out. 

The kiss was hungry, erotic, heated. Like black silk or the softest of midnight velvets, it rubbed across her senses and made her painfully aware once more of the desire running through her like the smoothest flow of golden honey. She felt his other hand release hers and join his other as he ran them down the sides of her body. Exploring the texture of her skin. Fingers tracing every line and hollow and curve he had committed to memory. He brought her body skillfully back to life. Touching her in ways that only a familiar lover would know how to do. 

Her eyes, burning with desire, looked up into his… and the calculating expression she saw there sent a shock through her. And it wasn't a pleasant one.

She knew then what was wrong, what had changed. He wasn't enjoying himself. 

He was touching her, and his contact was gentle and loving, but the desire was gone from his eyes… even if his body hadn't quite gotten the message.

Despite the detachment she was seeing take place in his eyes, she still thought that he was going to make love to her. That he was going to sink himself into her as far as he could go. She was prepared for that. For him to try and convince her to change her opinions about the mating ceremony through the touch of his body against hers. It was one of the traits that all Skinwalker males carried. They all knew just how to weaken their mates resolve enough to get what they wanted, if they tried long enough. She knew now for certain that, for whatever reason, he wanted their ceremony to take place soon… And he was nothing if not determined when he wanted something to go his way.

Her breaths were still coming fast, causing her chest to rise and fall rapidly, and she knew he was sensing her blood pulsing just below the skin. She also knew he could smell her overwhelming arousal, as well as feel the dampness between her thighs where he held himself completely still. Poised as her entrance. The hard length of his body pressing her firmly into the softness of the bed of furs. Scalding her with the touch of his skin upon hers.

And then he pulled away. And the shock of the cold air rushing over her skin as his left her drove the air from her lungs.

Turning slightly onto her side, she brought her legs together and sat up. Looking at him through a curtain of her own mussed up hair where he stood about thirty feet away. Surprise and more than a little hurt running through her mind.

His back was slightly turned, and he had already pulled on a pair of dusty jeans that had been discarded in a corner of the cavern before he had come back for her at the Rave. She heard the sound of the zipper sliding upwards and the button snapping in place, before he finally turned back to look at her.

Tossing her hair back, she met his gaze unobstructed. Confusion apparent in her expression.

He answered her question before she had a chance to verbalize it. "I'm sorry, Sophia. But if I'm not good enough to be permanently claimed as your true mate in front of the entire Clan, then I'm not good enough to have sex with."

Her jaw dropped. She couldn't help it. "I never said that I didn't want to officially mate with you, Luke."

"No, but you didn't exactly say you would either. And you just made it pretty clear that for whatever reason, you still have doubts about being with me for the rest of your life." He stalked back over to her. "So until you are ready to be my mate in truth, Sophia... I won't be in your bed."

Sophia felt something cold settle in her heart. "So, what then?" she asked bitterly. "You're going to find some other piece of tail to be with because I won't accept your proposal? I think everyone in the Wolf Lake has been wondering just how long it would take before you would become bored and head off in search of new territory."

Luke's eyes narrowed with something dark and dangerous, and before she could react, before she could anything at all, he lunged forward. Covering the space between them in a single leap, he grabbed her by the arms and hauled her off the nest of furs. 

Sophia gasped as her body hit his. The force driving the air from her lungs. His hands tightened into bands of steel on her forearms, and his body pressed unrelenting into hers. The bulge under his jeans hard against her stomach. 

She felt the stirrings of anger at his harsh and abrupt – if painless – treatment of her person, but before she could express it, his lips found hers again… and this time he didn't stop until he had just about driven every sane thought from her head.

Breathing a little harshly himself, he finally pulled away. Looking into her golden brown eyes with his that were burning with the light of a newborn star. The wolf in him was moving, shifting, just under the surface, and it clicked with her then that leaving things between them physically unfinished was costing him a hell of a lot more than it was costing her. And that was saying something.

"Don't… ever… say… that… again. " He forced out between clenched teeth. A faint growl echoing in his throat. "Or I swear I won't be responsible for how I react." He let her go so suddenly that she had to catch herself to keep from falling. Not an easy task while balancing on a pile of furs.

"The day I stop burning for you will be the day that I stop breathing." He admitted darkly. As if the admission almost didn't sit well with him. In light of her cruel words, a part of her really couldn't blame him. She had a crossed a line and there really wasn't any way of going back. And even if there was… she didn't think she would have known how to do it. There had only been a few moments in her life where something had completely and totally stunned her, and this one was ranking way up there.

She didn't know what to say, so she just stood there, staring back at him. Shocked silence her only response.

He was the first one to break it.

"It's getting late. We should head on home." He held his hand out to her. His face suddenly expressionless, like a slate wiped clean. No anger, no frustration, no tenderness. Nothing.

Sophia hesitated, before slowly placing her hand in his. Letting him help her step off the pile of furs. 

As she quickly replaced her bra and underwear, and numbly took the oversized shirt that Luke handed her, she couldn't help how her head seemed to almost spin with how quickly everything had just changed… 

And leaving her to wonder what exactly the hell had just happened.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 

Well… what did you think of that little slice? Do you think Sophia is being a nut, or that Luke is being a jerk? Review, and let me know what your thoughts are!

 Okay, that's it. That is the end of the first "episode" to VS2… The first part to the next episode "Can't Have Just One" should be up relatively soon… So take care till then!


	5. Can't Have Just One, Part One of Three

Virtual Season Two – Episode #26

"Can't Have Just One" 

Part One of Three

Based on the cancelled TV series, Wolf Lake,

written by Sapphira

Sequel to "The Virtual First Season Continuation"

**Disclaimer: **Don't own any of it… not the characters (unless they are my original creations) the music, or the original TV series in any form… I am making no profit off of this, or ANY of my other fanfics… I'm writing it purely for my own enjoyment, and hopefully for the enjoyment of some of the fellow fans.

****

Summary – Tensions between Sophia and Luke begin to rise, while Matt and John attempt to uncover the murderer in their midst… and the destiny of one male Skinwalker and the life of a human woman unknowingly begins to entwine…

Timeline – One week after the events of "Where The Wild Things Play"…

**_Europe_****__**

Veins of lightening lit the clouds, dancing whips of white-hot energy illuminating the midnight sky, forking across the expanse in a brilliant, dazzling display of nature. Thunder crashed overhead and the earth rumbled and rolled with the sheer ferocity of the storm.

The driving rain began to fall in heavy, suffocating sheets, instantly soaking everything that it touched, including the lone figure making his way through it. But he didn't seem to even be aware of the dangerous elements raging on above him, as he never altered from his course.

A bolt struck nearby. Viciously shaking the ground beneath his feet, filling the air with its ear-splitting repercussion, and the scent of burning ozone, but he didn't even hesitate. It was as if he was either a part of it all… or so completely separate that he couldn't find it within himself to be concerned.

He made his way steadily over the stone path in front of him, trees flanking him to either side. Strong wind ran through their rustling leaves, singing through the branches that threatened to snap under the pressure. He finally came to a small clearing that served as the front yard to a reclusive small mansion. Its only sign of life one light burning faintly behind its front door.

He walked up the granite steps leading to the entrance, tossing his long soaked hair back from his face, highlighted by the rain drops clinging to his emotionless profile, before turning the knob under his hand.

Walking out of the storm and into the warm enclosure of his current residence, Damien carefully shrugged out of his coat, leaving it to dry by the door. Boot heels clicked across the dark wood flooring as he made his way down the hallway. Echoes of the storm resounding within the walls of the house.

Entering his dark study illuminated only by a fire glowing in the hearth at one end, he casually reached over and flipped on the TV sitting against the wall on his way to the private bathroom adjacent to the office. When it tuned in, the sound of a TV reporter's foreign voice was the only sound that came from within the entire house as he moved so silently into the open bathroom. Flipping the light switch on the interior wall. Words easily translated filtered in weakly through the open door. He listened for a moment.

_"In other news… Officials are apparently still baffled by the recent string of explosions accruing in several different cities across the continent. Speculation has risen in regards to the purpose one might have in the assault of these locations, as none apparently serve any military or political purpose. There have also been some rumors surfacing that the recent bombings might be connected to another two that occurred in Russia earlier in the week. Russian officials refuse to comment, even though the death counts continue to rise…"_

Damien ignored the rest. Turning to look at himself in the mirror. Noting a few stubborn streaks of dried blood trailing over one side of his cheek and down the curve of his throat, as well as staining into the lines of his palms.

Turning the faucet on, he submerged both of his hands in the flow. Water turning a pale pink as it swirled down the drain. Finally leaving his hands clean and unmarked.

Cupping some water in his hands, he splashed his face. Cleansing away the proof of his latest project.

Looking back up at himself in the mirror as he continued to lean over the sink, he watched the water drip from his face, now physically devoid of the crimson stain of pain and death. He studied his reflection for a moment. No emotion of any kind rising to the surface. His features a perfect mask. Tossing his still damp hair back from his face yet again, he looked around for a rubber band to fix it, but hesitated upon  finally spotting one.

Glancing at his reflection again, he let his hand fall back away... and he left his hair loose.

Turning away, he flipped the light off as he left the bathroom. He kept walking, reaching over to turn the TV off as he went by just as the reporter announced an important breaking news story believed to be in connection to the chain of explosions that were rocking their continent almost on a nightly basis.

Silence filled the house once more as the screen died.

Walking over to turn the light off that sat in behind his desk, he casually glanced over to the smooth, barren tabletop, at the plane ticket resting there. Destination: Australia.

Pulling the small chain, he submerged the room in darkness, and unerringly made his way through the embracing shadows towards what would pass as his bedroom for this night.

**_Smokey_****_ Mountains_****__**

Shadows merged, darkness coalesced… Moonlight cast interesting plays of light here and there, but for the most part, the world surrounding him was swathed in blackness. And it suited him just fine.

He worked his way through the strange forests, dark blonde pelt rippling under hard muscle and sinew and bone. Not particularly caring which direction he shifted, or which path he moved towards. The purpose of him coming to such a place as this, was not to have any particular plan. All he wanted to do was lose himself momentarily in the embrace of his Otherness.

The past few months had been difficult. He hadn't been prepared for just how much. The separation from the Pack had proven to him why so many of their kind would be willing to sacrifice their lives in favor of being exiled. To never touch the fur or the mind of another of his species… it was a hell with no name, for its only option could be a human one. And the trauma such an event would create was not anything that could be relayed in human terms or human expression.

For that reason alone, he no longer knew if he should feel superior to the ungulates, or envy over the simple complexities of their emotions in comparison to his.

But he hadn't been exiled. He had chosen to leave. For many different reasons, he had chosen to leave the only world he had ever truthfully known. And they were for reasons he could now admit to having a little difficulty remembering, so much had changed.

Living amongst the humans had taken his toll… and not in a good way. He had feared he was beginning to lose himself in that world. He had felt like his other nature was slowly beginning to die off from the pressure of humanity and surrounding concrete. So with a soul full of panic of the likes he was unfamiliar with, he had come here.

He had made his way as quickly as possible to the closest potential haven at hand. And even though the mountains were unfamiliar, and there were none of his kind to answer his call, it was a beautiful territory, wild and untouched in areas, with plenty of prey to hunt and feed upon as he struggled to heal a part of himself that up until a few months back, he hadn't even realized could die.

Losing yourself to your wolven nature was a drug that he hadn't been able to refuse after being away from Wolf Lake for so long. He'd lost count of the days and nights he had spent in this form. For as long as he maintained it, the world that he had faced once upon as Tyler Creed had no meaning. Had no recognition. No basis in his reality.

And he was all too willing to give it up. That said something about his true nature, and the Skinwalkers in general. If forced to make a decision between their 'human' existence surviving, and their wolven one, the later was almost always chosen. This was just one of the many little things that separated them even farther from homo-sapiens.

For all his so-called sophistication and political ambitions, Tyler had allowed himself to become immersed in the most basic aspect of his nature. Run, Hunt, Kill, Feed, Live, keep running… He let the human world slip away from his current reality, and it had reached a point where he now knew he'd slipped into another world that he had taken for granted. A world that he had used, but had never really allowed himself to be a part of. Not really. Could any member of their dwindling species say otherwise? They were all guilty of turning their backs on what they were at heart. All guilty of pushing the Otherness under the restriction of human styled lives that they had no claim upon.

To be Skinwalker was to walk a very fine line, balanced between two different worlds… or so they thought. Maybe it wasn't meant to be a balancing act. Maybe they were supposed to lead a completely different and unique existence. Although damned if he knew what that was anymore. Once upon a time he had thought that he had known. His greatest dream had been to step out into the light and have the entire world acknowledge their existence. To acknowledge their superiority.

But he had learned a few months ago what happened when the shield of protection that had surrounded them for centuries was removed. He had finally been forced to face what had nearly driven their species to extinction in the first place, and the only way he could describe it, was a saying he had heard a long time ago… You stare into the Abyss long enough, and eventually it'll stare right back. He had seen the Hunters. Had spent time amongst them. He had seen what they were capable of, and what they had done to Skinwalkers hundreds of years ago. But in that glimpse into the past, he had also seen a part of himself... And that similar reflection was still all too raw in his mind.

Maybe that was what was really at the core of him having allowed himself to be consumed by his primal nature. To having spent weeks within this form. He didn't want to go back to the form of a man. He didn't want to have to face his past.

Besides, it wasn't like he had a home to go back to anyways. Everything that he once considered his life was now gone. Scattered to the winds like the ashes of old.

He couldn't go back to the world of Wolf Lake. He couldn't move forward into the world of the humans. There was no other choice, then the one that was at hand. And that was to keep doing what he was doing, and allow that side of him die that had once gone by the name of Tyler Creed.

And that was exactly what he intended to do. He would stay in these woods for the remainder of his lifetime, and the memories he had of walking on two legs would eventually slip entirely away into the sands of the past.

And not a moment too soon.


	6. Can't Have Just One, Part Two of Three

AN - I have no excuse good enough to explain my absence, so I'm not even going to try... Everyone has my heartfelt apoligies for taking so long. Hopefully this won't happen again, but I've given up on predicting what my muse and my life are going to do to me next. Let's just say that I've come to the conclusion that spring and summer are not going to be good times for me to write... so come on winter!

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Virtual Season Two – Episode #26

"Can't Have Just One" 

Part Two of Three

Sophia rinsed her cereal bowl out in the kitchen sink and placed it in the dish washer before eyeing the clock hanging above her.

It was early yet. The sun barely risen, but Luke had already been gone off to who knew where before she had even made it down to the kitchen. Attempts to get him alone to try and work out what had happened between them a week ago had proven to be futile. He obviously didn't want to talk to her about anything at the moment, even though she had woken up late last night to find him watching her from the doorway.

Her heart had leapt in her chest at the impact of his eyes upon hers in the darkness of her room. For a moment she had thought he would come to her. Take her back into his arms and sink himself back into her waiting body the way he had so many times in the past. But he didn't come to her. He turned around and left as silently as he had entered once he realized that she had awoke. Leaving her feeling bereft without his presence.

She was trying to be cool about all of this, but the truth was, this sudden indifference of his stung and stung sharply. She still wasn't exactly sure what this game of his was all about, but she wasn't going to capitulate to whatever conditions he thought he had the right to set.

If he thought that simply denying her sex was going to get him anywhere, then he was in for a nasty surprise. If he wanted to play his little game of nonchalant behavior towards her, then he could go right on ahead. Her views on the subject of a public mating ceremony had had time to concrete over the past week, and were not going to change. All she could do was hope that he snapped out of the stupidity soon so they could go back to the way things had been.

"Morning, sweetie." Her dad greeted as he came in. Already dressed for work. Badge glinting in the early morning sun streaming in through the kitchen windows. It was a surprise in and of itself that he still maintained his Sheriff of Wolf Lake status. It had taken encouragement from, well, just about everybody to keep him from quitting shortly after becoming Alpha. Even so, Sophia knew it was only a matter of time before his conscience ate away at him with the fear of his view of human law becoming blurred with the desire to do whatever he had to, to keep the Pack safe. The moment good material for a replacement presented itself, he'd be stepping aside. Him staying in only long enough for such a person to present himself was the best they all could expect. Just because he was Alpha didn't mean her father had changed… or that he was particularly proud of the role. But he did what needed to be done, and he had finally owned up to almost twenty years of running from destiny. It was enough.

"Morning, dad." She replied. Leaning back against the edge of the countertop. "What's work going to be like today?"

Matt grunted, pouring himself a cup of coffee. "Busy. I'm meeting John in an hour to go over that double homicide case. See if there are any potential leads we missed."

"Are you sure its one of our own that's responsible?"

Matt nodded. "Absolutely. Nothing human is capable of that particular type of killing. The wounds inflicted are typical of a feeding Skinwalker." He took a sip from the steaming mug in his hands. "I'm afraid that if we don't figure out who's responsible, we'll have another dead body on our hands soon."

Sophia cocked her head to the side. Frowning as she did so. "What makes you say that?"

"This couple was harmless. No threat to the Pack, and no ties to an unscrupulous operation. They were randomly chosen, and half eaten. Which means we have a rogue on our hands that has become addicted to the taste of human meat. It's not going to be able to stop now, and it knows it. It knows that death is the only true cure… Which is why it's covering its tracks so beautifully. It could be anyone. Even someone we'd all least expect."

Sophia quirked a brow. "Like Nancy?"

A shadow passed over Matt's eyes. A shadow full of sadness and guilt. "Yes. Like Nancy."

-----------------------------------------------

"What am I supposed to do, Sherman? I never expected her to be this stubborn. How can I make her understand?"

Sherman sat on the couch opposite of Luke. The amused quirk to his lips flicking on and off as he listened to the agitated words of the young man who had come to vent.

"Well, here's a shocking suggestion for your young ears, but have you ever considered telling her the truth? All of it?"

Luke dragged a hand through his hair restlessly. "I know her, Sherman. If I tell her everything, it'll only make her more determined to do things her way. And right now, more hesitation on her part is the last thing I need to deal with right now with the threat of so many challenges beginning to pop up. Besides, this **_is_** stuff I've talked to her about before. She didn't listen then, and she's not listening now."

"Challenges? What challenges?"

"Nothing serious enough to warrant any attention. At least not yet. But it's only a matter of time. Members of the Clan are already becoming suspicious because there hasn't been a claiming ceremony yet. It won't be long before the older males of the Pack begin to question our bond."

Sherman tilted his head to the side, grinning. "Are you afraid you won't measure up?"

Luke glared at him. "I'm afraid that if Sophia doesn't agree to consent to the ceremony, that the decision may be taken out of her hands entirely by another male strong enough to capture her. It's always been like this when a white female was of age. Why the hell do you think my sister took off when she did?"

"And you can't tell Sophia at least that much? She is the female in question, after all. She deserves to know."

"If I tell her that, she'll think I'm only pressuring the union because of her pelt color. I could less about that, but I know that there will always be a part of her that will wonder about my true motivations. I don't want that kind of doubt between us. Not after everything we've already been through."

"Well, Luke. In that case, this is something that is between you and her. I can't get involved in this, you know that."

Luke dropped his head back into his hands and groaned. "Come on, Sherman. I'm running on empty here. Can't you give me **_anything _**to work with? Any advice that might help?" He could feel Sherman's amused gaze on him even though he didn't bother to pick his head up. Sometimes it was just better to ignore the fact that the Keeper got some sort of sadistic enjoyment out of tormenting the Clan members. The old guy really needed to come up with some nicer hobbies.

"Sophia is still trying to adjust. Give her some time. She'll soon get used to the idea."

"And if she doesn't?" Luke asked pointedly. Listing his head far enough to peer out at Sherman from under his lashes. Eyes a brilliant slash of pale green against the shadows of his brow.

Sherman grinned his trademark Cheshire cat grin. "You're a Skinwalker male, Luke. Horny, healthy and in love. I'm sure you can come up with some unique way of convincing her."

-----------------------------------------------

"Victim number one, male, Caucasian, mid-twenties. Deep lacerations to back and legs. Throat crushed and heart removed. Lower abdomen shredded. Victim number two, female, also mid-twenties. Deep gouges to the face and neck. Left forearm snapped in two different places. Both legs heavily mutilated and lower abdomen also shredded."

Matt closed the file he was holding in his hands and tossed it back on the desk in front of him disgustedly. Rocking back in his chair to turn to look over at John. "No matter how many times I read that damn report, or go over the crime scene yet again with a fine tooth comb, I never discover any type of clue that might help us. As much as I hate to admit it, I don't think we're going to be able to catch this guy in time before he strikes again. There's just nothing here to work with."

John looked over his shoulder from where he stood by the drawing board, studying the other bits of information posted there about the double murders. "Aren't we supposed to be able to just… **_smell_** him out?"

Matt rubbed his eyes tiredly. "I've told you before. Whoever it is, is shielding himself like a son of a bitch. Just like Nancy could. Besides, the couple had been wandering all over the town throughout that entire day. They were covered with way too many scent spores from members of the Pack to be able to filter through them all.

John turned around and leaned his back up against the wall. Black long sleeved cotton shirt stretching tightly over his upper body as he assumed a position to relax in, hooking his thumbs in the pocket openings of his dark blue denim jeans.

"Back when I first started working for you, you told me about the serial killer you once had on the loose, named the 'Fear'. You told me that he disappeared, but what really happened?"

"I honestly don't know. We knew it was a Skinwalker, but we just didn't know who. Although there was some speculation that he was a member of the Old Guard. If that's the case, then he either ran far enough away that he could continue to carry out his killings without the Clan's interference, or he was killed by someone in the Pack while still in Wolf Lake."

John's brow rose speculatively. "And you wouldn't have any idea as to who that might have been?"

Matt shook his head. "If anyone in the Pack did kill that monster, then it was a member of the Old Guard. They don't talk about their dead, and they have the tendency to keep to themselves in almost all things. They don't get the rest of the Pack involved in their problems if they can help it. It's one of the reasons why they can be both a blessing and a curse to this town. You never know what it is that they're doing, but most of the Pack members, when they go home to see their children tucked safely into their beds, prefer it to stay that way."

Just then the door to the Precinct opened, and a young man strode in. "Oh, come now, Sheriff. We're not all that bad."

Matt's gaze narrowed and he came to his feet before he even turned to look at the source of that voice. Carefully watching the uninvited visitor as he strode in the rest of the way. Continuing to speak. "We do handle all of the Pack's dirty work, after all. Where would you all be if it wasn't for the Old Guard's… sacrifices, hmm?"

"Julian." Matt greeted the young blonde man coolly. "I see you've settled back into your life in Wolf Lake. Are you having any problems with your men?"

The pale blonde smirked sardonically. "As you've already graciously pointed out, Matthew… We keep our personal problems to ourselves."

"Then why are you here if there's not a problem?" John asked from clear across the room, but his chill tone was unmistakably distrustful. It was a tone of voice that had made countless other very uncomfortable in its day. A seasoned cop's voice in every sense of the word, but one wouldn't have known it to look at Julian's expression.

"Oh, there's a problem. But it's not mine. I have come here to give you information about your latest case, even though I know most in my position within the Old Guard would not." He paused a moment for effect before continued. Eyes glittering as if humored by something, and the firm lines of his full mouth twisted upwards mockingly. "Consider it my belated coronation gift for the new King of the Pack."

Matt's jaw tightened. Just what he needed. Another smartass. "What is it?"

"I know who your killer is, and where he's been living. If you would like to see for yourself and put an end to all your speculation, then follow me." And without further acknowledgement, he slid back inside through the glass doors of the office.

Matt and John shared one look of perfect understanding before grudgingly following suite. Both of them instinctively wondering if this was some sort of trap.

It wouldn't have been the most dangerous thing to have happened to them in the last six months.

----------------------------------------------------

**_Smokey_****_ Mountains_****__**

There are moments in one's life where their paths change dramatically. Forever altering the course that they had once thought their lives were destined to follow.

For Tyler Creed, that moment came with the sound of a gunshot blast and in the shape of a bullet.

He wasn't sure just what exactly happened. One minute he was running through the mountain forest's underbrush, and the next he was off his feet and sent flying through the air from the force of the impact. Landing hard on his side with his head smacking hard against an outcropping of rock.

The world around him viewed through the eyes of his wolven form spun violently as mind-numbing shock set in. He wasn't even aware of the pain as his blood began to pour from his body. He didn't even have a chance to so much as absorb what had happened to him or deal with his current life threatening situation.

He was pulled under by that black swirling vortex of unconsciousness before he even had so much as a chance to fight back.

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Enjoy? Do I still have my fans after my long absence? Please review and let me know...


	7. Can't Have Just One, Part Three of Three

**Virtual Season Two – Episode #26**

**_"Can't Have Just One"_ **

**Part Three of Three**

John frowned as Julian's progress stopped right in front of a small cabin at the edge of the lake, about a mile away from town.

"Who's place is this?" he asked. Observing the poorly cared for exterior and the thick underbrush that was currently trying to take it over. Made to look all the worse by the overcast grey sky above them.

"I think my job is done." Julian chimed as he turned and began to walk away. Black boots crunching against the natural debris strewn over the ground, as he slipped into the heart of the forest with a speed and agility that was surprising. Even for a Skinwalker. "You'll find the answers you're searching for in here."

"Hey!" John protested, making a move to follow him.

"Let him leave." Matt ordered. Eyes still on the house. "He's right. His job is done."

John turned back to look at him. Observing the grim lines upon Donner's face. "What do you mean? Do you know this place?"

It was a moment before Matthew replied. His gaze flickering out over the surrounding forest before coming back to rest on the front door, beginning to walk towards it. "Yeah. Yeah, I do."

"What the hell happened here?" John asked, trying to make sense of the sight that greeted him when he stepped through the front door, following Matt.

"Hell **_is _**what happened, John. But not to this place; To the man that used to live here."

To say that is was a mess would have been an understatement. To say that it looked like an explosion had gone off would have been a little bit closer to the truth.

The walls had been shredded. Furniture had been reduced to matchsticks. The shattered glass of windows glittered dully on the floor. The small kitchen nook's refrigerator and stove were now sitting against the cratered wall of the living room, where they had apparently been thrown. The smell of rotting food permeated the air. But it wasn't the most noticeable stench in the small cabin. The blood streaked across what remained of the walls and splattered over all the trash was.

John swallowed, and looked at Matt standing a few feet in front of him. His back still turned. "Who lives here?"

Matt picked up the broken rim of a coffee mug, sighed, and let it drop to the floor with a crash. "Buddy does… or did."

"Buddy? As in Tyler's number one goon?"

Matt finally turned back around to meet John's gaze. "Uh huh."

John blinked and looked around a little bit more closely. Subtly inhaling through his nose. "The blood in this room isn't human."

Matt sighed. "Yeah. He knew he was getting out of control. He was probably trying to staunch the cravings by feeding off of animals."

"You don't seem terribly surprised by all of this."

"For the past year I've noticed an increasing amount of "disappearances". All people that I believe can be traced back to Tyler in some way or another. Of course, I never had enough proof to put together something solid, but I believe that those people were killed because they had either out-lived their usefulness, or had tried to turn on Tyler."

John's brow rose a fraction. "So you think Tyler fed them to Buddy?"

"I don't think it's quite that simple. Tyler doesn't have any moral qualms about killing. It's what makes him so unpredictable. He doesn't need Buddy to do his dirty work. Especially if he knows that by doing his dirty work, he's compromising his second in command's abilities. Becoming addicted to the meat of a human is like a human becoming addicted to heroin. Except this isn't something you can get better from. There's no such thing as detox for man-eaters."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that I think Tyler knew his friend was addicted, and he was trying to save him in the only way he knew how. By delaying the inevitable outcome by supplying him with the "fixes" that could potentially buy him some more time. He knew Buddy would become unstable if he started to attack and feed upon random targets. At least with the system of elimination that Tyler had set up, he was able to control Buddy's urge to kill by directing it only towards those Tyler wanted destroyed."

"But then how did Buddy become addicted in the first place?"

Matt shook his head. "I have no idea."

Silence fell uncomfortably between them, and they continued to search the living room. Flipping through the debris in the hopes of finding some little clue on its occupant's whereabouts.

Suddenly John stiffened. Looking around him at the walls. "Matt?"

Matt glanced over at him from where he was rummaging through the closet. Its door swung precariously wide by only one hinge. "What?"

"The blood… the blood in this room…" his voice trailed off as he slowly stood.

Matt put down the pile of crumpled papers he had fetched from the interior of the closet. His attention centering on John. "What about it?"

"There's not enough of it." He finally answered. A look suddenly coming across his features. "There's not enough of it on these walls to warrant this type of smell. Besides…" he turned to look at Matt before finishing. "Isn't the scent of animal blood not supposed to register this strongly while we're still walking around on two legs instead of four?"

Matt stilled. He didn't even have to look in the particular direction to realize where the smell was actually coming from. It was the only room they hadn't made it to yet.

Later on, he wouldn't even remember the trip from the living room to the bedroom's door. He wouldn't even remember John's attempt to tell him to slow down, or his hand turning the knob. He would only remember the pressing need to see what was behind its, oddly enough, unmarked and still soundly closed door. He **_had _**to. He could do nothing less.

Even if the sight before him would haunt him for the rest of his life.

He stood in the doorway and stared for a while. Unaware of John's presence at his shoulder, also equally stunned. His brain tried to make sense of what his eyes were trying to tell it to see. It just couldn't understand… and why did it smell so bad? Blood shouldn't smell like that.

But it wasn't just blood rotting in that room. All those things that his mind didn't want to compute, all those lumps and pieces strewn across the mattress and floor and walls… had once been a part of two separate human beings.

Enough. He had seen enough.

"Oh, my God." John uttered under his breath as Matthew turned away. Pulling the door shut behind him to block out the scene. "He gorged himself. He gorged himself and then came back here and… "

"Regurgitated." Matthew finished for him. "He'd eaten more than his stomach could safely hold. More than two stomachs could safely hold."

"We've got to catch him. We've got to stop him before he does this to someone else."

Matt made his way back in to the destroyed living room. "It's too late. Can't you tell? He hasn't been back here since that night. Buddy may be unstable, but he's not stupid. He knew he was going to get caught, and he knows that the only thing left for him now in Wolf Lake is his execution. He ran."

"So what are we supposed to do now?"

"There's nothing we can do. The only one that might be able to track him down is Tyler, but if Tyler had been here than none of this would have happened in the first place. With Tyler controlling his strings, Buddy would have been under control. But now… now he's a loose cannon, and he's out there somewhere... And I pity the next person he hunts."

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**_Smokey_****_ Mountains_****__**

She loved the night. Loved to walk along her familiar trails at midnight, and appreciate the wildness thriving around her. She loved to lean against the trunk of a tree and tilt her head back to lose herself in the stars. She'd been doing such things since she was a child, and tonight was no different.

It was close to 2 am in the morning, and she was wide awake. But then, that really wasn't much of a surprise. She had always been very nocturnal. Preferring to sleep during the bright, boring days in favor of spending her time awake during its darkest hours.

Her dark hair swung freely, tangling about her shoulders as she an unrecognizable path that she knew like the back of her hand. Her feet unerringly finding purchase along the steep, rough terrain. She slid through the spaces between trees much older than her, and passed unconcerned wildlife as she stepped over bushes and pressed crooked, low hanging branches out of her way. The wind shifted, blowing across her face. Carrying with it the scent of the night.

And the sound of a gunshot.

Flinching, she jerked her head to the side towards the direction where the jarring sound had come from. Eyes sharpening and once relaxed, serene features hardening with awareness.

These woods, in fact this entire mountain, was protected not only by the government, but also by her. Her resources. Her connections. This place, as well as all the living creatures within it, had become her world. Her home. Her fortress from a life she wanted to forget. A life that wanted to forget her. It was the only place where she felt at peace. The only place where she found comfort.

And the very idea of a hunter poaching illegally on her land was enough to send an uncharacteristic wave of rage through her heart.

Stormy, pale blue-green eyes narrowed to mere slits, and she altered her path. Quickly, quietly making her way over the crest of the mountain towards her destructive trespasser.

------------------------------

John stood about fifteen feet away from what used to be Buddy's porch. Waiting grimly for Matt to complete his task inside and leave. Finally, he did.

"Are we finished here?"

Matt made his way over the rickety porch. Boot heels clicking across the brittle wood. Empty gasoline container held in one hand. He stepped off the porch and then stopped. Turning back around to face the cabin while he produced a match from his pocket.

Lighting it, he flicked it back into the house along with the empty container through the yawning front door. And was rewarded with the resulting **_'whoosh'_** of the flames as the lit match caught on the accelerant.

"We're finished."

John turned to look at Matt, and Matt, sensing his gaze, met it levelly with one of his own. They didn't speak for a moment, and only the sound of the fire racing through the small cabin and licking along its interior heavy in the late afternoon hour.

"Go on home to your wife, John." Matt finally said. "There's nothing else we can do here."

John's eyes went back to the cabin, the heat coming off of it incredibly overwhelming. After a few minutes of watching the flames as they began to swallow up the outside, he turned away. Disappearing into the forest as he did as Matt had instructed, and made his way home. His thoughts already turning to his pregnant mate who was surely waiting for him to return.

Matt didn't leave. Not even when the fire finally became a hungry, raging entity that lit the destroyed cabin into a torch. Thick black choking smoke trailing into the dusky sky as the heat from the fire radiated off of it. Causing beads of sweat to roll down the sides of his temples and soak into the back of his shirt. The scent of the smoke burning the back of his throat a relief from the lingering scent of other bloodier, meatier things. Things that he knew better than to try and label as the bits and pieces of what had once been two human beings.

And he had just become a part in covering up their hideous murder, while the one responsible had slipped out of his grasp and into an ignorant world of so many humans to feed upon. A world where people disappeared everyday, never to be found alive or dead again.

And for an addicted Skinwalker who would never be able to stop himself from stalking and killing and gorging, it was the perfect hunting grounds. A paradise for a creature never meant for the light of day.

Matt remained until it was safe to go, and then, only then did he leave when the cabin had been reduced to a fiery, collapsing pile of refuse. Submerging its secrets in the glowering embers, turning them into ash.

-----------------------------

She listened carefully from behind the trunk of a tree while the drunken hunter stumbled about clumsily. Miraculously maintaining his footing as he tripped over exposed roots, and slid down various embankments. Cursing loudly as bushes and brambles snagged his clothes and scratched his skin. Searching for his prize.

She knelt close to the ground, her body as still as the surrounding outcroppings of rock. Eyes narrowed, she watched him pause long enough to take another swig of the nondescript bottle clasped in his beefy hand. The other hand carelessly clutching a rifle. He swayed precariously on his feet. The smell of spilt alcohol apparent on his clothes even from where she hid.

Apparently having drained the bottle, he let out another slurred obscenity and hurled the bottle. It smashed into the side of a tree about five feet away from him. Shards of glass twinkling in the muted light of the night sky. She made herself even smaller. Curling in on herself to even further lessen the chances of being exposed. Although she doubted he would even be able to see her if she stood up and did the hula, judging by his inability to even make out the trees and bushes directly around him before smacking into them.

But he was still armed. And as long as he was armed, he was dangerous and unpredictable.

He was looking for whatever it was he had shot, and wasn't having much success. But if the dead or wounded animal was still in the general area, then it was only a matter of time before he found it, if by no other way then simply falling on top of it. But she couldn't do anything to stop him, unless he put that firearm down.

No sooner though had that grim thought crossed her mind, that the ridiculously drunken redneck decided that he suddenly wanted to take a nap. His loud, heavy breathing echoing in the surrounding threes as he literally dropped where he stood. The rifle rolling harmlessly away from his hand to rest in the crushed leaves a few inches away.

Slowing unfolding herself, she warily made her way towards him. Wanting to get her hands on that rifle before she attempted to look around for whatever it was that he had shot. She didn't want him waking up and mistaking her for his wounded game.

She wrinkled her nose as she got closer. Not even wanting to distinguish what the **_other_** smells present under the liquor were.

Leaning down to pick up the fallen rifle, she was rewarded with an obnoxious snort and a hideous whiff of what the passed out cretin's breath smelled like.

Fighting back a gag, she quickly stepped away while the hunter remained comatose. She turned and threw the rifle as hard as she could into the forest. Allowing the underbrush to swallow it up. Then, and only then did she ignore sleeping beauty, and start to look around for signs of life.

She didn't have to look long. Just as she had feared the intoxicated hunter would just moments ago, she practically tripped over it. Coming to a halt, she stared down, lips parting, at the ground in front of her feet, hardly daring to believe her eyes.

It was a wolf, pale in color, and soaked in blood. It was visibly struggling to breath, although it didn't appear to be conscious.

Kneeling down, she looked closer at the wound. Her mouth forming a grim line. Wolves had supposedly been extinct in these parts, although there had been a few times in the past where she believed she had heard them. There had once upon a time been a rehabilitation and breeding organization that had wanted to bring wolves back into this region, but the locals had complained. Stopping the project dead in its tracks. As far as anyone knew, the animals had been recaptured and taken somewhere else. But she had always wondered if they had gotten every single one.

She now had her answer.

Knowing that it was probably a lost cause, knowing that he wouldn't live long enough to see the sun again., she still peeled off her coat to wrap around the large furry body as a temporary gurney. She looked over her shoulder, calculating the distance to be about ten minutes from here to her cabin if she stuck to the deer trail. She looked back down at the wolf. Fingers lingering in the soft, thick fur and coming away sticky with warm blood.

She didn't know if she should continue on with this course of action. It was probably going to rank up there with one of the stupidest things she'd ever done, but she wasn't going to leave him here. If there was any chance at all she could save it, she had to act quickly while there was still something left to save.

Pulling a bandana out of her back pocket, she secured it tightly around the animal's muzzle, just in case, and slowly, carefully, slid her arms underneath and hoisted it up. Muscles along her thighs and arms rippling from the effort to balance close to a hundred pounds of almost dead weight.

Forcing her lungs to take in deep breaths despite the pressure of the animal held tightly to her chest, and praying that her physical training would see her through this, she began her walk home. The sensation of hot blood soaking into her clothes and sliding over her arms providing her with all the urgency she needed in ordered to keep holding on, keep walking…

Keep breathing.

Because she knew if she stopped long enough to try and catch her breath, the creature in her arms would die.

---------------------------------

**_End of Episode #26, "Can't Have Just One"_**

**_First Part of Episode #27, "Nature of the Beast", coming soon... _**


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